Mobile remote media control platform apparatuses and methods

ABSTRACT

The MOBILE REMOTE MEDIA CONTROL PLATFORM APPARATUSES AND SYSTEMS (“MR-Control”) transforms TV program schedule listing information and user channel selection via MR-Control components, into TV audience viewing data and ad effects data. A system is disclosed, comprising: a memory; a processor disposed in communication with said memory, and configured to issue a plurality of processing instructions stored in the memory, wherein the processor issues instructions for: obtaining TV program schedule listing data; providing the obtained TV program schedule listing data to a user mobile device; receiving an indication of user channel selection; determining a media program associated with the received indication of user channel selection; determining an ad associated with the determined media program; providing a survey question related to the determined ad to the user mobile device; and receiving a user response to the survey question.

RELATED APPLICATION

Applicant hereby claims priority under 35 USC §119 for U.S. provisionalpatent application Ser. No. 61/504,913, filed Jul. 6, 2011, entitled“Mobile Remote Media Control Platform Apparatuses, Methods And Systems.”

The instant application is related to PCT international application no.PCT/IL2010/000918, publication no. WO/2011/055365, filed Nov. 7, 2010,entitled “System And Method For Mobile Computing Transmission On ANetwork Of Data Associated With A Television Display.”

The instant application is further related to U.S. application Ser. No.13/341,400, filed Dec. 30, 2011, entitled “Mobile Remote Media ControlPlatform Methods”; U.S. application Ser. No. 13/340,933, filed Dec. 30,2011, entitled “Audience Atmospherics Monitoring Platform Methods”; U.S.application Ser. No. 13/340,953, filed Dec. 30, 2011, entitled “AudienceAtmospherics Monitoring Platform Apparatuses and Systems”; U.S.application Ser. No. 13/341,036, filed Dec. 30, 2011, entitled “MediaContent Based Advertising Survey Platform Methods”; U.S. applicationSer. No. 13/341,076, filed Dec. 30, 2011, entitled “Media Content BasedAdvertising Survey Platform Apparatuses and Systems”; U.S. applicationSer. No. 13/341,096, filed Dec. 30, 2011, entitled “Media ContentSynchronized Advertising Platform Methods”; U.S. application Ser. No.13/341,118, filed Dec. 30, 2011, entitled “Media Content SynchronizedAdvertising Platform Apparatuses and Systems”; U.S. application Ser. No.13/341,137, filed Dec. 30, 2011, entitled “Social Content MonitoringPlatform Methods”; U.S. application Ser. No. 13/341,165, filed Dec. 30,2011, entitled “Social Content Monitoring Platform Apparatuses andSystems”; U.S. application Ser. No. 13/341,183, filed Dec. 30, 2011,entitled “User Impression Media Analytics Platform Methods”; U.S.application Ser. No. 13/341,199, filed Dec. 30, 2011, entitled “UserImpression Media Analytics Platform Apparatuses and Systems”; U.S.application Ser. No. 13/341,217, filed Dec. 30, 2011, entitled “MobileContent Tracking Platform Methods”; and U.S. application Ser. No.13/341,254, filed Dec. 30, 2011, entitled “Mobile Content TrackingPlatform Apparatuses and Systems.”

This application for letters patent disclosure document describesinventive aspects directed at various novel innovations (hereinafter“disclosure”) and contains material that is subject to copyright, maskwork, and/or other intellectual property protection. The respectiveowners of such intellectual property have no objection to the facsimilereproduction of the disclosure by anyone as it appears in publishedPatent Office file/records, but otherwise reserve all rights.

FIELD

The present innovations are directed generally to media control, andmore particularly, to MOBILE REMOTE MEDIA CONTROL PLATFORM APPARATUSESAND SYSTEMS.

BACKGROUND

A home TV user may view TV programs from a plurality of channels. Theuser may operate a handheld remote TV controller sold with the TV set toselect TV channels. For example, the user may push buttons on the remotecontroller to switch channels, turn up/down audio volume, power on/offthe TV. Merchants advertise their products to attract consumers. Thusthe TV audiences may interact with the TV and select a desired channelwithout physically touching it via operating the remote TV controller.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

The accompanying appendices and/or drawings illustrate variousnon-limiting, example, innovative aspects in accordance with the presentdescriptions:

FIGS. 1A-1E show block diagrams illustrating example embodiments ofMR-Control;

FIGS. 2A-2B provide data flow diagrams illustrating data flows of TVremote monitoring within embodiments of MR-Control;

FIGS. 2C-2I provide logic flow diagrams illustrating logic flows of TVremote monitoring within embodiments of MR-Control;

FIG. 3A provides a data flow diagram illustrating data flows of mediacontent based advertising within embodiments of MR-Control;

FIGS. 3B-3E provide logic flow diagrams illustrating media content basedadvertising within embodiments of MR-Control;

FIG. 4A provides a block diagram illustrating a client mobile componentwithin embodiments of MR-Control;

FIG. 4B provides a combined data flow and logic flow diagramillustrating client-server interaction within embodiments of MR-Control;

FIG. 4C provides a block diagram illustrating MR-Control table top unitinfrastructure within embodiments of MR-Control;

FIG. 5A provides a data flow diagram illustrating data downloading fromsocial media within embodiments of MR-Control;

FIG. 5B provides a block diagram illustrating infrastructure of a mediameasurement portal within embodiments of MR-Control;

FIGS. 5C-5D provide logic flow diagrams illustrating obtaining socialmedia content within embodiments of MR-Control;

FIGS. 5E-5F provide example data records illustrating data structures ofsocial media data within embodiments of MR-Control;

FIGS. 6A-6F provide logic flow diagrams illustrating social mediacontent taxonomy within embodiments of MR-Control;

FIGS. 7A-7F provide example data flow and logic flow diagramsillustrating cross-channel data collection of media analytics withinembodiments of MR-Control;

FIGS. 8A-8K provide screen shots illustrating user interfaces of amobile client component within embodiments of MR-Control;

FIGS. 9A-9E provide example screen shots illustrating user interfaces ofmedia analytics within embodiments of MR-Control;

FIGS. 10A-10H provide example block diagrams and exemplary screen shotsillustrating cross-channel media analytics within embodiments ofMR-Control; and

FIG. 11 shows a block diagram illustrating embodiments of a MR-Controlcontroller;

The leading number of each reference number within the drawingsindicates the figure in which that reference number is introduced and/ordetailed. As such, a detailed discussion of reference number 101 wouldbe found and/or introduced in FIG. 1. Reference number 201 is introducedin FIG. 2, etc.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION

The MOBILE REMOTE MEDIA CONTROL PLATFORM APPARATUSES AND SYSTEMSprovides a client-server interactive platform whereby a user may operatea general purpose personal mobile device (e.g., a smart phone, etc.) toreceive a list of TV programs schedules and submit a selection of TVchannel via the personal mobile device. In one implementation, the usermay operate the personal mobile device as a TV remote controller. In oneimplementation, the MR-Control may receive the user's selection of achannel and determine what media contents the user has elected to watch.In one implementation, the user's channel selection and viewing statusmay be populated to a social media platform, and the MR-Control mayobtain user response with regard to a TV program from the social mediato perform analytics for TV program feedback review.

For example, in one implementation, a user may plug a MR-Controlaccessory (e.g., 120 in FIG. 1) into his mobile device, such as asmartphone (e.g., an Apple iPhone, BlackBerry, Google Android, Palm, HTCEvo, Samsung Galaxy, etc.), laptop, personal digital assistant (PDA),tablet computer (e.g., Apple iTouch, iPad, etc.), and/or the like, tofacilitate communication between the mobile device and a home TV set. Inan alternative implementation, the MR-Control accessory may be astandalone table top unit which may not need to be attached to a usermobile device. For example, the table top unit may communicate with adesktop computer, a laptop computer, a cell phone or mobile deviceand/or the like via wired or wireless connection (e.g., Bluetooth, WiFi,etc.). In further implementations, the table top unit may monitoraudience activities as further illustrated in FIGS. 1C, 2E-2H. Furtherimplementations of the table top unit are illustrated in FIG. 4C. Withinimplementations, a MR-Control server may obtain real-time TV programlisting, including the TV program schedule, advertisement schedule,and/or the like, from a TV network. The user may then obtain the list ofTV program schedules from the MR-Control, e.g., as shown at 115 in FIG.61. The user may then submit a channel selection, e.g., tap on the touchscreen of the mobile device as shown at 105 in FIG. 1. In oneimplementation, upon receiving the user channel selection, theMR-Control server may retrieve data record from a media content databaseand check program table to determine what's the TV program on air. Forexample, if the user selects the channel “CBS,” the MR-Control mayascertain “CBS” has “The Big Bang Theory” on air based on the timestampwhen the user submits the selection. In one implementation, theMR-Control may further retrieve a program table to obtain informationwith regard to the advertisement streamed during the intervals of the TVplay “The Big Bang Theory” and/or the product placement advertisementstagged in the TV play “The Big Bang Theory” on “CBS.”

In another implementation, the MR-Control may parse commercial adinformation retrieved at and generate prompt questions, surveys, and/orthe like 408. For example, if the MR-Control determines the user issupposed to watch a series of “Audi” commercial during the show “The BigBang Theory,” the MR-Control may prompt a survey including questionswith regard to automobile purchasing. In another implementation, theMR-Control may keep a record of advertisements that has played onchannels the user has recently selected (e.g., for a period of past 2weeks, etc.), and generate prompt questions based on suchadvertisements. In one implementation, the user may submit responses tosuch questions.

In a further implementation, when a user is provided a question withregard to an embedded advertisement in the TV show (e.g., “are youinterested in the red bag the character is carrying?” etc.), the usermay submit a request to learn more and/or purchase the product. In thatcase, the MR-Control may provide a merchant URL to the user and/orredirect the user to the merchant site.

In one implementation, MR-Control may monitor whether the user is“actually” attending and watching the selected TV channel. For example,the user's mobile device may capture, aggregate and packetizeatmospherics data (e.g., taking photos of the user, recoding audioclips, obtaining GPS information, etc.) and submit to the MR-Control,which may in turn decode the atmospherics data to analyze ad effect andaudience perception, as further illustrated in FIGS. 2E-2G.

MR-Control

FIG. 1A shows a block diagram flow chart illustrating work flows ofMR-Control within embodiments of the MR-Control. Within embodiments, theMR-Control platform 105 may facilitate clients, such as merchants, brandname manufacturers, media producers, and/or the like to plan 105 aadvertisement campaign program, track advertisement targets to determinead delivery 105 c (e.g., whether the ads are viewed by the audience,etc.) and performance 105 b (e.g., whether the advertisements meet asales/brand image goal, etc.).

Within implementations, the MR-Control platform 105 may interact withuser mobile devices, e.g., PDAs, smart phones, etc., for targeted mobileadvertisement delivery 104. For example, in one implementation,MR-Control platform may obtain a TV viewing status information from auser's mobile device, and determine the TV program content the useris/has been watching based on TV schedules, as further discussed in FIG.1B. When MR-Control determines the user selected channel contains a TVad of “Geico” 104 b, MR-Control may deliver promotions, rewards,coupons, questionnaires, etc., related to “Geico” as a targeted ad 104 ato the user mobile device.

In one implementation, MR-Control platform 105 may obtain data relatedto user interactive activities with regard to mobile ads, TV viewing,Internet 102 (including online browsing, purchasing, etc.), socialmedia, and/or the like to analyze ad effects, TV rating so that todetermine delivery 105 c and performance 105 b of an advertisementcampaign. Within implementations, the ad campaign planning 105 a, adperformance 105 b and ad delivery 105 c, may be separately executed bythe MR-Control platform 105 for each media type, e.g., TV, print,Internet, social media, etc.

FIG. 1B shows a block diagram illustrating a user engaging a personalmobile device as a TV remote control within embodiments of MR-Control.In one embodiment, a user may download a MR-Control client component forinstantiation on his general purpose personal mobile device 115. Forexample, the user may obtain a MR-Control application from the iTunesStore and download it to his Apple® iPhone, iTouch, iPad, and/or thelike. In one implementation, the user may plug-in a MR-Control accessory120 to the mobile device 115 so that the mobile device may communicatewith a home TV set 130 as a remote controller.

In one implementation, upon instantiating the downloaded MR-Controlclient component, the user may receive a schedule listing of TVprograms, and may select a channel that the user is interested. Forexample, the user may tap on the listed item to select “CH2: CBS The BigBang Theory 105.” In one implementation, the MR-Control plug-inaccessory 120 may receive the indication of user channel selection andtransmit such indication to the home TV set 130, and the TV 130 mayswitch to the channel “CBS 110” accordingly.

In a further implementation, the user's selection of channel “CBS 105”may be transmitted to a MR-Control, which may in turn automaticallypopulate a message on social media, e.g., a Facebook status updateshowing the user “is watching The Big Bang Theory on CBS 135.” In analternative implementation, the user may elect to manually enter andpopulate the social media feeds via the MR-Control client componentinstantiated on his personal mobile device.

For another example, the social message, e.g., a Tweet message, maycontextually tag the text on key terms to indicate what the user iswatching, e.g., the Tweet hashtags “#The Big Bang Theory,” “#CBS,” etc.In one implementation, the hashtags may link to profile information of aTV show, including its scheduled airing time, crew information,description, and/or the like. In further implementations, the Tweethashtags may be employed for social content data taxonomy engine, asfurther illustrated in FIGS. 6B-6E.

FIG. 1B shows a block diagram illustrating an example embodiment ofaudience attendance monitoring within embodiments of the MR-Control.Within implementations, MR-Control may monitor the audience attendanceof selected TV program. For example, upon a user selecting a TV channelat his personal mobile device 115 (e.g., by tapping on the channellisting as shown at 105 in FIG. 1A), the user may or may not be presentwatching the TV program broadcasting on the channel, e.g., the user maystep away, may engage in other activities distracting him from the TV,may invite one or more other audience watching the selected TV channel,etc. In such scenarios, MR-Control may constantly, periodically and/orintermittently “monitor” the audience status to obtain knowledge of theaudience viewing data.

As shown in one example in FIG. 1B, the personal mobile device 115 mayautomatically snap a photo and/or a video clip of the audience sceneincluding the audience 118 watching the TV program 110. For example, theMR-Control may be configured to snap a photo or video clip periodically(e.g., every 10 minutes, etc.). The MR-Control may then packetize theobtained photo/video clip as audience atmospherics data 125 for audienceattendance analysis.

In further implementations, MR-Control may include various data into theatmospherics data packets. For example, MR-Control may “listen” andrecord an audio clip of the audience scene. For another example,MR-Control may prompt the user to indicate how many audience are presentto watch the on-going TV program. For another example, MR-Control maymonitor whether the user is engaging in other application activities onthe personal mobile device 115, e.g., email(s), Facebook, browseractivities, gaming applications, etc. For another example, MR-Controlmay include GPS information of the personal mobile device 115 into theatmospherics data.

In one implementation, MR-Control may be configured to automaticallycreate photo/video/audio captures. In another implementation, MR-Controlmay prompt the user to manually enter desired information, such as howmany individuals are present to watch the TV program, and/or request theuser position the built-in camera of the mobile device to snapphotos/video clips. In one implementation, MR-Control may providepromotion incentives for the user to cooperate with such requests, e.g.,lottery opportunities, etc.

In one implementation, MR-Control may analyze the obtained audienceatmospherics data 125. For example, as shown in FIG. 1B, MR-Control mayidentify the number of audience 138 at an associated timestamp from anaudience scene photo/video 135 via face recognition software, e.g.,Apple iPhoto face recognition, etc.

FIG. 1C shows an example of intelligent mobile questionnaire withinimplementations of the MR-Control. In one implementation, MR-Control maysend synchronized questionnaire to a user's personal mobile device 115based on the media program on-air at the user's selected TV channel. Forexample, if the user's selected TV channel 130 includes an advertisement145 of Audi automobiles, MR-Control may generate a question 123 toinquire the user's desired automobile brand. Such inquiry results may becollected by MR-Control and fed to the advertising brand merchant 150(e.g., Audi, etc.) to determine performance of the advertisement 145.For example, if the user selects “Audi” when inquired about his desiredautomobile brand after watching the Audi advertisement channel, it mayshow effectiveness of the advertisement 155 over the TV channel. Infurther implementations, MR-Control may include product placementadvertisements, and/or the like in the pop-up questionnaire 123, asfurther discussed in FIGS. 2 and 7B.

FIG. 1D shows an example of media analytics within embodiments of theMR-Control. In one implementation, a MR-Control client may desire toknow public opinions of their products, e.g., brand name products, TVprograms, and/or the like. For example, as shown in FIG. 1D, theproducer “CBS,” e.g., merchant 150, may want to know audience's reactionabout the production “The Big Bang Theory” 180. In one implementation,the MR-Control may collect data from social media platforms, such as,but not limited to Twitter, Facebook, and/or the like, user comments andactivities with regard to the show “The Big Bang Theory.” For example,MR-Control may obtain Tweets about users' comments on “The Big BangTheory” 185. For another example, MR-Control may obtain Facebook usercomments, activities (e.g., user “like” of the “The Big Bang Theory”page, news feed, etc.) from Facebook. Further implementations ofobtaining data from social media platforms are discussed in FIGS. 5A-5F.

In one implementation, MR-Control may generate a media analytics report190 based on the obtained social media user comments to reflect audiencereaction to the show “The Big Bang Theory.” For example, in oneimplementation, the report may comprise statistical data with regard toaudience age, demographics, occupation, etc. Further examples of mediaanalytics report are discussed in FIG. 8C.

FIG. 2A shows a block diagram illustrating data flows between NR-Controlserver and affiliated entities within various embodiments of theMR-Control. Within various embodiments, one or more users 233 a,MR-Control server 220, social media 250, TV network 270, MR-Controldatabase(s) 219, merchant 280, and/or social media 250 are shown tointeract via various communication network 213.

In one embodiment, the MR-Control may receive a list of real time TVprogram 237 a. For example, in one implementation, the TV program 237data may comprise information such as channel information, media programinformation of each channel, program schedule information, and/or thelike. For example, the TV network 270 may provide a (Secure) HypertextTransfer Protocol (“HTTP(S)”) PUT message including the TV schedule data237 a in the form of data formatted according to the eXtensible MarkupLanguage (“XML”). Below is an example HTTP(S) PUT message including anXML-formatted TV schedule for the MR-Control server:

PUT /TVschedule.php HTTP/1.1 Host: www.TV.com Content-Type:Application/XML Content-Length: 718 <?XML version = “1.0” encoding =“UTF-8”?> <TVSchedule> <Date> 09-09-2000 </Date> <Channel1> <ChannelID>CH001 </ChannelID> <ChannelName> CBS </ChannelName> <Program1><StartTime> 9:00:00 </StartTime> <MediaID> 1234456 </MediaID> <EndTime>9:45:00 </EndTime> </Program1> <Program2> . . . </Program2> . . .</Channel1> <Channel2> . . . </Channel2> . . . </TVSchedule>

The media program may further comprise information such as media airtime, media length, advertisement tag timestamp, ad name, ad productinformation, and/or the like. The media program may further comprise asub-table comprising embedded advertisement tags (e.g., see 343 a inFIG. 3A).

In further implementations, the TV schedule 237 may comprise sub-tablesincluding information with regard to the media programs. For example, anexemplary XML-formatted TV program table takes a form similar to thefollowing:

<TVProgram> <ID> 00001 </ID> <Name> The Big Bang Theory </Name> <Genre>Comedy </Genre> <Networks> CBS </Networks> <Actors> <Actor1> Jim Parsons</Actor1> . . . </Actors> <FirstRun> 08-2008 </FirstRun> <AiringTime><StartTime> 9:00:00 </StartTime> <EndTime> 9:45:00 </EndTime> <Weekday>Thursday </Weekday> <Frequency> Weekly </Frequency> . . . </AiringTime><KeyWords> <KeyWord1> Geeks </Keyword1> <KeyWord2> Physicists</Keyword2> . . . </KeyWords> <Characters> <Character1> Sheldon Cooper</Character1> <Character2> Penny </Character2> . . . </Characters> . . .</TVProgram>

In one embodiment, the user 233 a may operate a client mobile device,which may receive a list of real time TV programs 237 b. In oneembodiment, upon reviewing the received channel schedule 237 b, the usermay submit a channel selection by tapping on a selected channel (e.g.,see 105 in FIG. 1B). In one implementation, the user mobile device maybe enabled with an infrared remote control component (e.g., a plug-inaccessory 120 in FIG. 1B), and may send the channel submissionindication 235 a to a client TV 233 b (e.g., a home TV set) via aninfrared communication channel, which may result in a channel switch onTV. In another embodiment, when the user selects the channel from hismobile device (e.g., an Apple iPhone, etc.), the channel selectionmessage 235 b may be transmitted to the MR-Control server 220 in realtime.

In another implementation, the MR-Control server 220 may provide the TVprogram schedule data to a TV set-top box (STB) 201, e.g., via a cablenetwork, wherein the STB may receive user TV event messages 235 a andforward such information 235 c to the MR-Control server 220. In anotherimplementation, the STB 201 may directly communicate with a MR-Controlinfrared component (e.g., 120 in FIG. 1B), a table unit, and/or thelike. In one implementation, the TV event 235 a/b/c may comprise avariety of TV events, such as, but not limited to TV on/off, STB on/off,channel switch, and/or the like. In further implementations, when theuser has registered non-live media facility (e.g., DVR, DVD, TiVo, etc.)with the MR-Control, the TV event 235 a/b/c may comprise DVD playeron/off, TiVo on/off, TiVo channel change, and/or the like. In oneimplementation, to operate and exchange data with the STB, thepresentation layer on the user mobile device may adopt developmenttools, such as but not limited to Android, iOS app development tools,and/or the like. In one implementation, the TV set-up top box maysimilarly employ a presentation layer development tool compatible withthat of the user mobile device, and may additionally employ HTML5 andweb 2.0 presentation layers.

In one implementation, a TV channel selection event 235 b may be loggedby the MR-Control server 220 and stored as a real time data record in aMR-Control database 219. For example, in one implementation, the userdevice may provide a HTTPS POST message including the TV channelselection message 235 b in the form of data formatted according to theXML. Below is an example HTTP(S) POST message including an XML-formatteduser trigger for the MR-Control server:

PUT /CHsubmission.php HTTP/1.1 Host: 255.000.00.1 Content-Type:Application/XML Content-Length: 701 <?XML version = “1.0” encoding =“UTF-8”?> <CHSelectionEvent> <EventID> 1111 <EventID> <EventType> CHSwitch </EventType> <Time> 19:00:00 </Time> <Date> 09-09-2000 </Date><UserID> JDoe </USerID> <UserName> John Doe </UserName> <DeviceID>JD0001 </DeviceID> <IP> 255.000.00.1 </IP> <HardwareID> 00001</HardwareID> <AppID> JDDOEMOBILE 00001 </AppID> <MAC> 00:00:00:00:00:00</MAC> <Channel> <ChannelName> CBS </ChannelName> <Category> Comedy</Category> <Program> The Big Bang Theory> </Program> <Episode> 4-1</Episode> <StartTime> 19:00:00 </StartTime> <EndTime> 19:29:45</EndTime> <Duration> 29′45″ </Duration> </Channel> . . .</CHSelectionEvent>

In further implementation, the user's mobile device may send eventmessages. Such event messages may include channel selection message 235b, user checkin/checkout action (e.g., user signing in/out to aMR-Control mobile/web-based client portal, etc.), and/or the like. Inone implementation, the events may be sent to the MR-Control server 220via Https Post web based API, which may comprise a type identifier and aset of parameters of the event data, e.g., channel selection, userresponse, etc. In one implementation, MR-Control server 220 may savesuch event data at CSV format. For example, the following Tables I andII provide an exemplary data structure of an event message:

TABLE 1 Watching Event Data Structure User Action Event Type ParametersMR-Control App Started 1 EventID, UserID Pulse Event (keep alive 2EventID, userID, zipcode, ping, sent every 10 min) SourceID, time-zone,isSocial, tmsID, timestamp Change change 3 Same as Type 2 Check in 10Same as Type 2 Check out 11 Same as Type 2

TABLE 2 Event Data Parameters Parameter Type Details EventID INT Uniqueidentifier that is generated for each event that is added to the DBUserID String Unique identifier for a MR- Control user. The client appmay send the device UDID. Zipcode INT Zipcode as entered by the user atthe client app SourceID INT An ID in a media service program thatidentifies a channel Time-zone INT The offset from GMT tmsID StringUnique identifier of a program (an episode or a program with a singleoccurrence). Using the tms data, these can be mapped also to theshow/series isSocial INT A boolean that is used to filter social eventdata from being shared with friends (e.g., see 275a)

In one embodiment, upon submitting a channel selection, the user 233 amay populate social media feeds of his viewing status 275 a to thesocial media network 250, wherein the user's friends may view hisstatus, knowing what the user is watching, electing to “like,”“dislike,” and/or comment on his status, and/or the like. For example,in one implementation, a MR-Control client app may comprise a socialfeature (e.g., see 715 in FIG. 7A) so that a user may input a socialmedia message (e.g., 715 b/c in FIG. 7A). In another implementation, theMR-Control may automatically generate a social message based on apre-populated message format (e.g., a Tweet format with hashtags, etc.)send a message indicating the user's viewing status 275 b to the socialmedia 250, which may automatically populate a social media statusupdate. In such cases, the social media platform 250 may request userauthorization for MR-Control server 220 to access, e.g., download socialdata or send social data to social media, etc. The MR-Control may obtaina user token for authorization to access the user's social mediaprofile, content, and/or the like. The user authorization may be furtherdiscussed in FIGS. 5A-5C.

For example, in one implementation, the MR-Control may provide a HTTPSPOST message including a social message 275 b in the form of dataformatted according to the XML. Below is an example HTTP(S) POST messageincluding an XML-formatted user viewing status 275 a/b for theMR-Control server:

PUT /UserSocial.php HTTP/1.1 Host: www.MR-Control.com Destination:www.Facebook.com Content-Type: Application/XML Content-Length: 701 <?XMLversion = “1.0” encoding = “UTF-8”?> <SocialMessage> <MsgID>Facebook1111 <MsgID> <Time> 19:00:00 </Time> <Date> 09-09-2000 </Date><UserID> JDoe </USerID> <UserName> John Doe </UserName> <UserTokenID>12324 </UserTokenID> <AppID> MR0001 </AppID> <Action> <ActionType>Status Update </ActionType> <Content> ″is watching The Big Bang Theoryon CBS″ </Content> <Rating> N/A </Rating> . . . </Action> <Tags> <Tag1>Big Bang Theory </Tag1> <Tag2> CBS </Tag2> . . . </Tags> . . .</SocialMessage>

In the above example, the MR-Control server 220 may automaticallypopulate a social message to the user's Facebook page, showing a statusupdate “John Doe is watching The Big Bang Theory on CBS.”

In a further implementation, the user 233 a may receive friends'recommendations 277 of TV programs from the social media 250 (e.g., see705 in FIG. 7A). For example, the user may view a scroll-down list offriends' recommendations from a user interface via the user's mobiledevice.

In further embodiments, MR-Control may load data 278 from the socialmedia platform 250, e.g., user profile information, usercomments/activity data related to an advertisement/a TV program, and/orthe like. Further implementations and example data structures of thesocial media data 278 are discussed in FIG. 5F.

FIG. 2B shows a block diagram illustrating data flows between MR-Controlentities within alternative embodiments of the MR-Control. Withinimplementations, user mobile device 233 a may perform “ambientlistening” on the user. For example, when a user has submitted a channelselection, it is not guaranteed whether the user is indeed watching theTV program selected, e.g., the user may walk away, engaging in otheractivities such as playing video games, chatting with others, etc. Assuch, the user's mobile device 233 a may “listen-in” the user'sbehavior, e.g., by capturing live video of the surroundings of the user,by recording audio clips, by capturing a picture, and/or the like, tocapture information as to whether and/or what the user is watching theTV. In one implementation, such “listen-in” data (e.g., video clips,audio clips, pictures, device application status, GPS coordinates, etc.)may be aggregated and packetized as atmospherics data 239 andtransmitted to the MR-Control server 220, which may analyze suchatmospherics data to determine whether the user is watching, andintegrate the atmospherics analytics in an audience statistics report245. In one implementation, the MR-Control may provide the audiencestatistics report 245 to the TV network 270 for TV program audiencefeedbacks.

For another example, in one implementation, the user device 233 a maygenerate an atmospherics data package as a HTTPS POST message in theform of data formatted according to the XML. Below is an example HTTP(S)POST message including an XML-formatted atmospherics data 239 to provideto the MR-Control server 220:

PUT /Listen-in.php HTTP/1.1 Host: 255.000.00.1 Content-Type:Application/XML Content-Length: 701 <?XML version = “1.0” encoding =“UTF-8”?> <Atmospherics> <AtmosID> AT0003 </AtmosID> <AtmosType>Listen-in </AtmosType> . . . <Time> 19:00:00 </Time> <Date> 09-09-2000</Date> <UserID> JDoe </USerID> <UserName> John Doe </UserName><DeviceID> JD0001 </DeviceID> <IP> 255.000.00.1 </IP> <HardwareID> 00001</HardwareID> <AppID> JDDOEMOBILE 00001 </AppID> <MAC> 00:00:00:00:00:00</MAC> <Data1> <Type> audio </Type> <FileFormat> MP3 </FileFormat><FileName> MyRecord </FileName> <Length> 10s </Length> <Size> 567 KB</Size> . . . </Data1> <Data2> <Type> Image </Type> <Format> JPEG</Format> <FileName> MyPic </FileName> <Exif> <Source> iPhone </Source><Timestamp> 19:00:00 <Timestamp> <size> 1024 X 768 </size> <focus>600/100 </focus> . . . </Exif> . . . <Data2> <Data3> <Type> GPS </Type><Content> 45 Garden Street </GPS> . . . </Data3> <Data4> <Type> DeviceApp </Type> <Timestamp> 19:00:00 </Timestamp> <App1> <Name> Angry Bird</Name> <Type> Gaming </Type> <Status> Active </Status> . . . </App1></Data4> . . . </Atmospherics>

The user device may perform “ambient listening” and generateatmospherics data package constantly, intermittently, and/orperiodically (e.g., every hour, etc.) to “listen-in” user's watchingstatus, e.g., whether the user is paying attention to the selected TVprogram. In the above example, the generated atmospherics data packagemay comprise a variety of data segments, such as a “MyRecord.mp3” audioclip which may indicate whether the played audio matches a selectedchannel program, whether the user is chatting with friends (e.g., see298 at FIG. 2D); a “MyPic.JPEG” photo taken by an iPhone camera, whichmay indicate whether the user is present with the TV set, and/or one ormore individuals are present (e.g., see 297 at FIG. 2D); GPS informationof the user mobile device which may indicate whether the user is presentat his residential address where the home TV is located (e.g., see 299 cat FIG. 2D); user mobile device application status information includingan actively running gaming application (e.g., “Angry Bird”), which mayindicate the user is playing the video game instead of paying attentionto the TV program (e.g., see 299 a at FIG. 2D). In one implementation,the atmospherics data 239 a and/or analytics may be incorporated into adata record 290 a and stored in the database 219.

In another implementation, the user mobile device may send a deviceapplication event 241 indicating user device application status to theMR-Control server 220. For example, the device application event 241 maycomprise an actively engaged application information on the device,e.g., application ID, application name, application category, push emailheart beat pulse, etc, which may suggest audience activities whilewatching TV, e.g., video gaming, texting, calling, checking email,browsing, playing music, editing photos, and/or the like. For example,in one implementation, the user device 233 a may generate a mobileapplication event as a HTTPS POST message in the form of data formattedaccording to the XML. Below is an example HTTP(S) POST message includingan XML-formatted device application status 241 to provide to theMR-Control server 220:

PUT /MobileApp.php HTTP/1.1 Host: 255.000.00.1 Content-Type:Application/XML Content-Length: 701 <?XML version = “1.0” encoding =“UTF-8”?> <MobileApp> <Time> 19:00:56 </Time> <Date> 09-09-2000 </Date><UserID> JDoe </USerID> <UserName> John Doe </UserName> <DeviceID>JD0001 </DeviceID> <IP> 255.000.00.1 </IP> <HardwareID> 00001</HardwareID> <AppID> JDDOEMOBILE 00001 </AppID> <MAC> 00:00:00:00:00:00</MAC> <EventType> gaming </EventType> <App1> <Name> Angry Bird </Name><Type> Gaming </Type> <Status> Active </Status> <StartTime> 19:00:45</StartTime> <EndTime> 19:00:56 </EndTime> <Duration> o′11″ </Duration>. . . </App1>

In one implementation, the device application status 241 may comprise alist of application names that have been open and active for a minimumamount of time (e.g., 10 seconds, etc.). In another implementation, thedevice application status 241 may be periodically harvested to theMR-Control serer.

FIG. 2C provides a logic diagram illustrating user-server interactionswithin embodiments of the MR-Control. In one embodiment, a user mayinstantiate a MR-Control application component on a mobile device 250.The user may also plug a MR-Control accessory (e.g., 120 in FIG. 1) intohis mobile device to facilitate communication between the mobile deviceand a home TV set.

In one implementation, the user may submit a session request 253 to theMR-Control server 220 via the mobile application, e.g., as shown inTable 1, the session request 253 may comprise a user ID and anevent/session ID to indicate the MR-Control application has stared. Uponreceiving a user request, the MR-Control server 220 may determinewhether the user has registered with MR-Control 255. For example, in oneimplementation, the user may be a new user to the MR-Control applicationservice, who may just download and install the mobile application buthas not registered. If the user is not registered 258, the user may berequested to submit registration information, such as user name, phonenumber, email address, residential address, and/or the like forregistration 260. The MR-Control may also obtain a physical address, ahardware ID of the user mobile device, etc., for registration purposes.

In one implementation, upon registration, the MR-Control server 220 mayobtain and store a user application ID, and/or a session ID 265 to startthe MR-Control service session. In one implementation, the MR-Controlserver 220 may obtain a real-time TV program listing 267, e.g., from aTV network, a TV broadcasting service, etc. In one implementation, theMR-Control server 220 may obtain the TV schedule updates on a periodicalbasis (e.g., daily, etc.), and store the TV schedule information at a TVschedule database. In one implementation, the user 233 a may receive alist of TV programs 270 via the MR-Control application, e.g., see 710 inFIG. 7A.

In one implementation, the user mobile device may send a user eventmessage 280 to the MR-Control server 220, and the MR-Control server maymonitor user event messages 276 from the user device. As discussed inFIGS. 2A-2B and will be further discussed in FIGS. 3A and 5A, thereceived user event at 276 may comprise a variety of events/messages,such as, but not limited to user TV event (e.g., 235 b in FIG. 2A), userdevice application event (e.g., 241 in FIG. 2B), atmospherics data(e.g., 239 in FIG. 2B), social content (e.g., 525 a/b in FIG. 5A),response to ads/surveys (e.g., 339 in FIG. 3A), and/or the like. In oneimplementation, upon receiving the message, the MR-Control may determinea type of the message 288. In one implementation, the user event messagemay comprise user channel submission event 289 b, check-in/out messages,and/or the like, e.g., see 235 a in FIG. 2A. For another example, theuser event message may comprise atmospherics data 289 a (as furtherillustrated in FIG. 2E), ad/survey response 289 c (as furtherillustrated in FIGS. 3B-3C), social data 289 d (as further illustratedin FIG. 5B), non-live TV consumption message 289 e (as illustrated inFIG. 2G. For example, in one implementation, the MR-Control maydetermine the message types 289 a-e based on the data structure, e.g., afield value of a field “message type” as shown in Table 2, message typecode in the header information of a received data packet, and/or thelike.

FIG. 2D provides a logic flow diagram illustrating TV channel submission(e.g., 289 b/e) message (for live TV, and/or non-live TV program such asDVD playing, TiVo, media on demand, and/or the like) processing withinimplementations of the MR-Control. In one implementation, upon receivinga channel TV event message at 289 b/e, the MR-Control server may parsethe received data message 2001 and save it in a raw data messagedatabase, e.g., as XML-formatted records in 219 a. For example, avariety of exemplary XML-formatted TV event message data structures(e.g., TV on/off, STB on/off, DVD on/off, channel change, etc.) arediscussed at 235 a in FIG. 2A.

Within implementations, the MR-Control may determine whether eachreceived TV event message indicates a stable TV channel programselection, or a channel surfing. In one implementation, the MR-Controlretrieve a list of unprocessed TV message records (e.g., grouped peruser profile) 2002 from the raw data store 219 a. For every twoconsecutively received messages 2005, the MR-Control may calculate theelapsed time in-between 2008, and determine whether the elapse time isgreater than a pre-determined surfing threshold (e.g., 5 seconds, 10seconds, etc.). For example, when the elapsed time is shorter than thesurfing threshold, indicating the user may be frequently switchingchannels to browse the program, the MR-Control may not consider thechannel selection message as effective TV viewing, and may filter suchmessage records from TV viewing analysis 2013.

In another implementation, when the elapsed time is greater than thesurfing threshold 2009, suggesting the user may at least spend an amountof time staying on the selected channel, the MR-Control may furtherdetermine whether the elapsed time is greater than a capping threshold2015. For example, when the elapsed time is too long, greater than thecapping threshold (e.g., 2 hours, 3 hours, etc.), it may suggest a usermay just let the TV on without watching. In such cases, MR-Control mayapply capping edit rules to compute a “real” watching time 2025. Forexample, if the elapsed time between a first TV channel switch and asecond channel switch is 5 hours, the MR-Control may not log 5 hours asthe watching time for the first selected channel, as the cappingthreshold is 2 hours. The MR-Control may in turn determine the watchingtime of the first selected channel as capped by a STB/TV off event(e.g., when a STB/TV off event is received during the elapsed time, thewatching time may not exceed the timestamp of the STB/TV off event), TVprogram end time (e.g., when the playing TV program on the firstselected channel ends during the elapsed time, the watching time iscalculated as the time elapse between the first TV channel event and theTV program end time), and/or the like, e.g., at 2023. In furtherimplementations, the MR-Control may apply cutoff thresholds based onhistorical heuristics via statistical analysis 2023. For example, theMR-Control may determine the watching time based on individual habits,e.g., a user has been observed to stay on the same channel for at most 1hour, etc. For another example, the cut-off threshold may be analyzed bychannel, e.g., 1 hour on CBS, 2 hours on ABC family, and/or the like.

In one implementation, when the elapsed time does not exceed a cappingthreshold at 2015, and/or when the watching time has been re-calculatedbased on capping rules at 2025, the MR-Control may retrieve TV programinformation on the user selected channel 2018, and generate a userchannel selection log file 2020. For example, the log file may comprisefields such as user ID, channel ID, channel selection time, userwatching time, channel program name, channel program ID, and/or thelike. Such generated log files may be fed to a user TV viewing dataengine 2030 for audience analytics 219 b. For example, the audienceanalytics database 219 b may be utilized to analyze TV viewing rates ofa TV program, product/brand impression of advertised products during theuser watching time, and/or the like. Exemplary audience analyticsreports are discussed at FIG. 10A-10H.

the MR-Control server 220 may retrieve TV program information todetermine the TV program played on the user selected channel 292. Forexample, the MR-Control may query on a TV program table (e.g., obtainedat 267 at FIG. 2C) based on an instant timestamp and the user selectedchannel. The MR-Control may log the user channel selection with thetimestamp 292 in a database, e.g., at 290 a in FIG. 2A.

In one implementation, MR-Control may generate TV viewing data for theretrieve TV program 293. In one implementation, MR-Control may associatethe user selection to the TV viewing rate of the retrieved TV program,and may refine the TV viewing rate with atmospherics analytics at 306.For example, in one implementation, the MR-Control may monitor groups ofaudience's channel selection, wherein the audience groups may be definedbased on age, geography, and/or the like. In one implementation, theMR-Control may generate an audience summary via a dashboard, e.g., seeFIG. 8H.

FIG. 2E provides a logic flow diagram illustrating atmospherics data(e.g., 289 a) analytics within implementations of the MR-Control. In oneimplementation, upon receiving an atmospherics data message 289 a, theMR-Control server may decode the atmospherics data and obtainatmospherics artifacts 296 a, e.g., a photo, an audio clip, and/or thelike. In one implementation, for each decoded artifact, the MR-Controlmay determine the artifact type 296 b, e.g., based on the file name,file extension, etc.

In another implementation, the MR-Control may incorporate the receiveddevice application status (e.g., 289 f) for user activity analytics. Forexample, the MR-Control may capture active application s running on thedevice 299 a from the received device application data, and determineuser activities when viewing 299 b, e.g., emailing, browsing Internetcontent, texting, video gaming, and/or the like. Such indicated useractivity data may be incorporated into audience attendance estimation2100.

In one implementation, the artifact may comprise a visual data file 297,such as a video file (e.g., “wmv,” “mp4,” “avi,” “rm,” etc.), an imagefile (e.g., “JPEG,” “bmp,” “tiff,” “gif,” etc.), and/or the like. In oneimplementation, the MR-Control may determine graphical content 297 ofthe visual file. For example, the MR-Control may perform image analysisto determine whether the photo image, and/or video frames comprise ascene of audience, and/or a TV screen. In one implementation, a mobileapplication at the user mobile device, e.g., iPhone, etc., may performface recognition at a photo taken at an iPhone, and integrate such datain the atmospherics data package, e.g., an iPhoto including two faces,etc. In another implementation, the MR-Control server may perform facialrecognition to determine audience presence 297 a. In otherimplementations, the MR-Control server may perform image analysis todetermine user activities in the photo image, e.g., reading a book,doing housework, and/or the like. In further implementations, aMR-Control panelist may review the photo image and determine audiencestatus.

In another implementation, the MR-Control may determine whether a TVscreen image matches the TV program associated with the user channelselection 297 b, e.g., the user may switch to watch recorded program(e.g., TiVo, DVD player, etc.) instead of live TV program on thechannel, and in such cases, the MR-Control may not receive an indicationof such change. For example, in one implementation, MR-Control mayperform image analysis to determine whether the received image photo(and/or a video frame grab) contains a TV screen shot 297 b, e.g., bydetecting edges of a rectangular shaped object on the image, etc. Foranother example, the MR-Control may store a plurality of sample screenshots from the TV program played at the user submitted channel, and maycompare the received image photo with each of the stored sample screenshots. In further implementations, a MR-Control panelist may assist inreviewing and determining whether the user TV screen matches the playedTV program. In one implementation, if the MR-Control determines the useris absent from a TV set, or engaging in other activities from thegraphic analysis, MR-Control may generate negative heuristics withregard to TV viewing data of the TV program on air.

In another implementation, if the received atmospherics data comprisesan audio artifact (e.g., with a file extension of “way,” “mp3,” “ape,”“m4a,” etc.), the MR-Control may perform audio analysis to determine acontent of the audio 298. For example, the MR-Control may analyze thefrequency range of the audio content to determine the sound source,e.g., whether it is human voice, ambient noise, media broadcasting,and/or the like.

In one implementation, if the audio content comprises human voice (e.g.,within the frequency range 60˜7000 Hz), the MR-Control may determinewhether the human voice is from the audience or broadcasting media. Forexample, the MR-Control may perform voice recognition to determinewhether the human voice matches with any of the characters in the TVprogram on air on the user submitted channel, e.g., at 298 a.1. If not,the MR-Control may determine such human voices may indicate audiencepresence 298 a, e.g., whether more than one user is present with the TVset.

In further implementations, if the audio file comprises human voice, theMR-Control may extract verbal content from the audio file to determinewhether an audience conversation, or a human conversation from mediaplaying, is related to the TV program on air on the user submittedchannel 298 a.2. For example, the MR-Control may adopt speechrecognition software (e.g., Nuance, IBM WebSphere Voice, etc.) toextract key terms from the conversation, and compare whether the keyterms are related to key words stored with the TV program in thedatabase. For example, if MR-Control extracts key terms “quantummechanics,” “physics,” “big bang,” etc., from the human conversation inthe received atmospherics audio artifact, and the user submitted channelCBS is playing “The Big Bang Theory,” MR-Control may determine theaudience is watching the show on air. In such cases, the MR-Control maynot need to distinguish whether the human conversation in the audio fileis from the audience or TV, but focus on mining the content of theconversation.

In another implementation, if the MR-Control determines the audioartifact comprises ambient noise, MR-Control may determine anenvironment of the audience 298 b. For example, if the background isoverly noisy, the user may not be watching the TV program.

In another implementation, if the MR-Control determines the audioartifact comprises media sound (e.g., music, etc.), the MR-Control maydetermine whether the audio media content matches the TV program on airon the user submitted channel 298 c via a media recognition software(e.g., a Shazam alike music recognition kit, etc.). For example, if theuser selected channel CBS has “The Big Bang Theory” scheduled at themoment, but the MR-Control determines a Lady Gaga song in the receivedaudio atmospherics, this may indicate the user is not watching the TVprogram. In one implementation, if the MR-Control determines the user isdistracted from the TV program based on the audio content, MR-Controlmay generate negative heuristics with regard to TV viewing data of theTV program on air.

In an alternative implementation, the MR-Control client component, whichmay be instantiated on a user mobile device (e.g., a downloadableapplication such as, but not limited to an iPhone application, anAndroid application, etc.) and/or a table top standalone unit, mayobtain atmospherics data to determine the program the user is watchingwithout user indication of the channel. For example, the MR-Controlcomponent may obtain audio recording, video recording, signatures imagecaptures, and/or the like of the audience watching environment, andsubmit the obtained data to MR-Control server. In one implementation,the MR-Control server may analyze the obtained data to determine whatthe audience is watching in a similar manner as illustrated at 297, 298in FIG. 2E, but without the user's channel selection indication.

In one implementation, the MR-Control may perform an audio/videorecognition procedure to identify a TV program, e.g., via digitalsignatures embedded in the program, and/or the like. In anotherimplementation, the MR-Control may extract key terms from theaudio/video captures, and form a query on a database of TV programs tofind a match. For example, in one implementation, the MR-Control mayextract textual terms from the obtained audio media program excerpts,such as “big bang,” “quantum physics,” “Sheldon,” etc., and may form aquery in a database of TV programs which may return a result indicatingthe obtained audio media program excerpt may be related to the TV show“Big Bang Theory.”

In an alternative implementation, rather than uploading sampling and/orthe entirety of the captured audio/video median content, the MR-Controlmay analyze the recorded audio/video content to generate a uniquesignature and/or a unique hash, which may be used for further matching.For example, the unique signature/hash may take a form similar to asequence of 0-1 representation of a sampling of the recorded mediacontent. In one implementation, the signature/hash generation may beperformed at a user device (e.g., the user's mobile phone, the table topunit, etc.), which may upload the generated signature/hash sequence tothe MR-Control server. In another implementation, the user device mayupload media content sampling, clips or the captured entirety to theMR-Control server, which may then perform the signature generation.Within implementations, software tools/components such as, but notlimited to i-brainz, and/or the like may be adopted to generate audiosignature/hash.

In further implementations, such “listen-in” activities may be performedon a standalone table unit, which may communicate with a user computervia a wireless network, and/or transmit the “listen-in” results to theMR-Control server.

In further implementations, lighting sensor data 299 c may indicate thelighting condition of the user environment to determine the viewingstatus. GPS information contained in the atmospherics data may indicatewhether the user is located with the home TV 299 d, e.g., by comparingthe instant GPS location with a registered user residential address,etc.

In one implementation, MR-Control may analyze the variety ofatmospherics data to determine whether the user should be accorded as a“viewer” of the real-time TV program on air. In one implementation, asshown in FIG. 2H, the MR-Control server may adopt a procedure togenerate a progressive weighted sum of atmospherics scores to determinewhether the user is “watching” or “not watching.” When the weighted sumof different atmospherics scores exceeds a predetermined threshold, theuser may be considered “not watching,” and the MR-Control may not needto proceed with further atmospherics analysis to improve efficiency ofthe atmospherics analytics.

For example, at 299 d in FIG. 2H (e.g., comparing received user GPSinformation with the user's registered residential address in FIG. 2D),the MR-Control may determine an address type 2163, and may assign aweight to the GPS atmospherics factor based on the address type from anatmospherics GPS weight table 2164. For example, the atmospherics GPSweight table may assign 0.1 to a residential address, 0.2 to a Starbucksstore, 1.0 to an outdoor address (e.g., a national park, etc.), and/orthe like. In one example, the MR-Control may assign a GPS factorweighing score similar to the following table:

TABLE 3 GPS Information Weighing Scores GPS Address Type Weighing ScoreResidential address 0.1 Commercial Coffee Shop, 0.5 Address RestaurantsHotel 0.1 . . . . . . Shopping Site 0.5 Outdoor Highway 1   AddressNational 0.8 Parks . . . . . .

In one implementation, the MR-Control may calculate the atmosphericsscore 2200, which may be the assigned GPS weight at this stage, anddetermine whether the score is greater than a predetermined threshold(e.g., 1, etc.) 2205. If so, the MR-Control may conclude the user is notwatching the TV and quit scoring 2300. Otherwise, the MR-Control mayproceed with analyzing device app analytics data at 299 a, and repeatthe process of updating atmospherics score to determine whether athreshold has been met to suggest the user is not watching.

At 2165, the MR-Control may determine an active application type 2165,and assign a weight based on the application type 2168. For example, anactive gaming application may be accorded 0.7; an active emailapplication may be accorded 0.5; an active internet browser may beaccorded 0.5, and/or the like:

TABLE 4 Device Application Activity Weighing Scores Active ApplicationType Weighing Score Gaming Application 0.7 Email New Email 0.4Application Window Inbox 0.1 . . . . . . Internet Opening New 0.4Browser Link Scrolling 0.4 Down . . . . . . P2P Chatting 0.4 MessengerDialing 0.5 Software . . . . . . Office Text Editor 0.2 Application . .. . . . . . .

In one implementation, the MR-Control may calculate an updatedatmospherics score 2170 and determine whether it exceeds the threshold2175. If it has not exceeded the threshold, the MR-Control may proceedwith audio analytics results from 298, provided such audio analytics isavailable from the atmospherics data. In one implementation, theMR-Control may retrieve and/or determine audio analytics indications2178, e.g., ambient noise level, media music which does not match the TVprogram on air, human voice chatting on irrelevant topics, etc. In oneexample, the MR-Control may assign a weight based on audio analyticsindications 2180 similar to the following table:

TABLE 5 Audio Heuristics Weighing Scores Audio Heuristics Type WeighingScore Ambient Noise Loud 0.5 Level Medium 0.2 Minor 0.02 . . . . . .Human Voice Key Terms 0 Matches TV program Key Term not 0.3 Match . . .. . . Media Sound Matches TV 0 program Not match 0.3 . . . . . .

In one implementation, the MR-Control may update the atmospherics score2185 by adding the audio scores to determine whether it exceeds thethreshold 2190. Otherwise, MR-Control may proceed to perform graphicalanalytics at 297 a/b given such visual data is available. In oneimplementation, the MR-Control may retrieve and/or determine visualanalytics indications 2192, e.g., user activity, user presence, numberof individuals, TV screenshot, etc. In one example, the MR-Control mayassign a weight based on visual analytics indications 2195 similar tothe following table:

TABLE 6 Visual Heuristics Weighing Scores Visual Heuristics TypeWeighing Score Audience None 0.5 Presence More than 1 0 (count 2viewers) . . . . . . Audience Reading etc. 0.4 Activity Housework 0.3Working 0.5 TV Screen Matches the 0 Shot TV program Does not 0.3 Match .. . . . .

In one implementation, if the updated score 2193 does not exceed thethreshold, the MR-Control may conclude the user is watching the TVprogram 2305, and feed such indication to 2100 for studying TV viewingrates. Otherwise, the MR-Control may conclude the user is not watching2300, and may not count the user as a “viewer” of the TV program.

In one implementation, the MR-Control may process the decodedatmospherics data based on a progressive mechanism, to reduce processingcomplexity. For example, as shown in FIG. 2I, the MR-Control may startwith a less complicated analysis of GPS information, device applicationstatus, and progressively proceed with visual data processing with ahigher complexity.

FIG. 2F shows a logic diagram illustrating user-server interactions of“listen-in” within alternative embodiments of the MR-Control. In oneembodiment, the MR-Control may instantiate “listen-in” when a user hassubmitted a channel selection to determine whether the user is watchingthe selected channel. In another implementation, the MR-Control mayperiodically check the listen-in data (e.g., every 30 minutes, etc.).

Within embodiments, the user's mobile device may capture image, audiodata, video data, GPS coordinates and/or the like 2105. In oneimplementation, the MR-Control client component may automaticallyconfigure the user device to capture atmospherics data, e.g., obtainingGPS coordinates, capturing audio data, capturing device applicationstatus data, etc. In another implementation, the MR-Control clientcomponent may prompt a request for the user to hold up the mobile deviceto position the camera for image/video capturing of the TV screen, theaudience scene, and/or the like.

In one implementation, the MR-Control may extract identifyinginformation from the captured monitoring data 2106, such as a hardwareID, MAC address, and/or the like. The MR-Control may determine whetherthere is any external event 2108, e.g., the user is sending a responseto survey question, submitting a channel selection, etc. If there issuch external event 2108, the MR-Control may launch the event and embedthe atmospherics information into the user responses 2110 fortransmission. For example, in one implementation, the embeddedatmospherics data may have the same timestamp as the original userresponse data payload.

In another implementation, the MR-Control may aggregate, and packetizedifferent atmospherics data 2113 in a compliant data format fortransmission to the MR-Control server (e.g., see 239 in FIG. 2B).

In one implementation, upon receiving a message from the user device2115, the MR-Control server may determine the message type 2118. In oneimplementation, if the message is an atmospherics data packet 2120, theMR-Control server may decode and analyze the atmospherics data packet2123 to extract information as to the user's viewing status. Forexample, the MR-Control server may perform an optical characterrecognition (OCR) procedure on a photographic frame extracted from thereceived atmospherics data to determine whether the TV program played onTV matches the program schedule associated with the user's selectedchannel, e.g., whether the program is “correct” 2125. For example, ifthe user has submitted a selection of channel “CBS,” the MR-Control mayquery on a program table to determine that “The Big Bang Theory” shallbe on air at the timestamp when the atmospherics data is received. TheMR-Control may then ascertain whether the received photo of the user'sTV set indicates the show on TV is “The Big Bang Theory.”

In a further implementation, the MR-Control may determine whether theuser is watching 2128. For example, the MR-Control may perform OCR onthe received graphic data (e.g., photos, video clips, etc.) to determinewhether the user is present in front of the TV. For another example, theMR-Control may determine how many users are watching the TV program bybeing present. For another example, the MR-Control may determine whetherthe user is present in front of his home TV by analyzing the receivedGPS coordinates, e.g., when the user's GPS coordinates reflects he hasmigrated from his home address to a second address, it may indicate theuser is no longer watching the TV program after submitting channelselection.

In a further implementation, the MR-Control may generate viewing data2130 to determine audience rating of a TV program, wherein analysis ofthe atmospherics data may contribute to the viewing statistics.

FIG. 2G provides a logic flow diagram illustrating non-live mediaconsumption message (e.g., 289 e) analytics within implementations ofthe MR-Control. In one implementation, a user may submit a non-livemedia registration request 2150 to the MR-Control, e.g., the user mayregister TiVo, etc. so that MR-Control may fold the viewing data ofnon-live media into TV viewing data analytics. In anotherimplementation, the user may select a channel that comprises on-demandvideo service. In one implementation, upon sending a request, the userdevice may submit the user external IP (e.g., the IP address of the usermobile device, etc.), internal IP address (e.g., the IP address of theTiVo facility, a set-top box, etc.) to the MR-Control for registration2155. The user device may further provide a media access key toMR-Control as authorization credentials for remote monitoring of theuser's non-live media facility. In further implementations, the user mayconfigure parameters of the facility (e.g., a set-top box, etc) as shownin FIGS. 7I-J.

In one implementation, MR-Control may register the user's non-live mediafacility 2156, and may establish a secure communication channel with thenon-live media facility. In one implementation, the MR-Control mayreceive a non-live media schedule 2158, which may be automaticallydownloaded from the user's non-live media (e.g., media on-demand,Internet TV streaming service such as ABC episodes, Hulu.com, etc.),and/or provided by the user (e.g., a list of recorded programs forreplay).

In one implementation, upon receiving an indication of non-live mediaselection 289 e, the MR-Control platform may check the program table todetermine the TV program on the non-live media 2160, and log the userchannel selection of an associated TV program with a timestamp 2125. TheMR-Control may also obtain and analyze atmospherics data 2123, e.g., ina similar manner as discussed in FIG. 2D, to generate TV viewing datafor the selected TV program 2127.

FIG. 2I provides a logic flow diagram illustrating user mobile device asa TV remote (e.g., 235 a in FIG. 2A) within implementations of theMR-Control. In one implementation, a user may plug a MR-Control infraredaccessory (e.g., 120 in FIG. 1B) into a user mobile device 2500. Theuser mobile device may be a general purpose personal device (e.g., asopposed to a dedicated TV remote facility, etc.), such as, but notlimited to an Apple iPhone, iTouch, iPod, iPad, BlackBerry, Palm, HTCEvo, Google Android, Samsung Galaxy, and/or the like. The user mayinstantiate a MR-Control client component on the user device 2505 (e.g.,see FIGS. 7A-7L, etc.), wherein the MR-Control client component maydetermine whether an infrared plug-in is available 2510. If so, the userdevice may initiate an automatic scan on its communication stack forTVs/DVDs 2515. If the query returns a TV/DVD is available 2520, the userdevice may obtain a physical address of the scanned facility, anddetermine a type of the facility 2523, wherein such information may belogged into a communication stack 2528. In another implementation, if noresults come out of the automatic scan at 2520, the user device mayobtain user submitted TV/DVD parameters 2525 (e.g., TV/DVD brand, type,etc.), and adjust the scanning mode based on the user submittedparameters 2526.

Upon establishing communication with a TV/DVD set, the user device maymonitor on user's channel submission 2530. When a channel selection isobtained, the user device may transmit a channel selection indication tothe logged TV/DVD address via the infrared plug-in accessory 2535. Inthis manner, the user may operate a general purpose mobile device as aTV/DVD remote.

FIG. 3A shows a block diagram illustrating data flows between MR-Controlentities within alternative embodiments of the MR-Control. Continuing onfrom FIGS. 2A and 2B, in one embodiment, the MR-Control may receive alist of real time TV program 237 a from the TV network 270, and a listof advertisement tags 243 a associated with the TV programs 237 a. Forexample, for each TV media program, which may comprise both segments ofTV programs (e.g., a TV play) and a plurality of advertisements (e.g.,interleaved during the TV play broadcasting). For another example, theadvertisement tags 243 a may label embedded advertisement in a scene ofthe TV play, e.g., a pair of sunglasses carried by a character in the TVshow “The Big Bang Theory” may comprise a product placementadvertisement tag. In a further implementation, for product placements,the ad tags 343 a may comprise video frame grabs with embedded graphicindications of the placed products in the scene, e.g., see FIG. 7G.

For example, in one implementation, the TV media program table 237 a(e.g., see also 237 a in FIGS. 2A-2B) may comprise a sub-tablecomprising embedded advertisement tags. For example, in oneimplementation, an exemplary XML record of a media program datastructure with ad tags 343 a may take a form similar to the following:

PUT /AdTag.php HTTP/1.1 Host: www.TV.com Content-Type: Application/XMLContent-Length: 718 <?XML version = “1.0” encoding = “UTF-8”?> <Media><MediaID> 123456789 </MediaID> <MediaName> The Big Bang Theory</MediaName> <Content> <Season> 3 </Season> <Episode> 2 </Season><MediaLength> 68′34″ </MediaLength> <KeyWords> Vampire, Blood, South,</Keywords> . . . </Content> <MediaChannel> CBS </MediaChannel><MediaAirTime> 9 pm 09/09/2000 </MediaAirTime> <MediaSource> XXXProduction </MediaSource> <MediaGenre> Comedy </MediaGenre> . . .<AdTag1> <AdID> M0008 </AdID> <AdType> Regular </AdType><AdStartTimeStamp> 20′34″ </AdStartTimeStamp> <AdEndTime> 22′45″</AdEndTime> <AdSponsor> Audi </AdSponsor> <AdProductInfo> <ProductName>Audi R8 </ProductName> . . . </AdProductInfo> . . . </AdTag1> <AdTag2><AdID> M0009 </AdID> <AdType> Product Placement </AdType><AdStartTimeStamp> 25′54″ </AdStartTimeStamp> <AdEndTime> 28′45″</AdEndTime> <AdSponsor> XYZ-Designer </AdSponsor> <AdProductInfo><ProductName> French Style Sunglasses </ProductName> . . .</AdProductInfo> <AdPrompt> ″Do you want to learn more about the red bagin the scene?″ </AdPrompt> <AdRedirect> www.buythings.com/XYZ/spring2000</AdRedirect> <AdInteractive> ScreenShot.gif </AdInteractive> . . .</AdTag2> . . . </Media>

The above XML example shows a media program “The Big Bang Theory season3, episode 2” which is scheduled to be on air on CBS at 9 pm on Sep. 9,2000. The example media program comprise an ad tag which may be aregular advertisement (e.g., non-product placement or embedded in thescene) of Audi automobile, and another ad tag which may be an embeddedproduct placement, e.g., a “pair of XYZ-designer sunglasses” as shown ina scene during the TV program (e.g., see FIG. 7G). In a furtherimplementation, the MR-Control may redirect the user to a URL“www.buybags.com/XYZ/spring2000” if the user clicks to learn more aboutthe product. In one implementation, the MR-Control may generatesynchronized advertisement to a user based on the ad tag by providing apop-up static ad 338 b, e.g., “Do you like Penny's sunglasses?” (e.g.,see 720 b in FIG. 7F). In another implementation, the MR-Control maygenerate an interactive ad 338 b including a tagged screenshot of the TVprogram containing the placed product (e.g., see 750 c in FIG. 7G).

In another embodiment, the MR-Control server 220 may generate questions338 b synchronized and/or related to the TV program ads 343 a, which maybe devised by the MR-Control based on the media content the user hasviewed, the advertisement the user has viewed, and/or the like. Forexample, if the channel the user has been watching recently has playedadvertisement of “Audi,” the MR-Control may prompt a question to theuser such as “which brand automobile would you prefer?” to determine theadvertisement effects. In another example, the user 233 a may receivereal-time information synchronized with a product placement embedded inthe TV program. For example, when a user is watching a TV show, he mayreceive a prompt question 338 b related to an embedded advertisement ina scene of the TV show, e.g., “Do you want to learn more about Penny'ssunglasses?” In a further implementation, the MR-Control may redirectthe user to a URL “www.buythings.com/XYZ-designer/spring2000” if theuser clicks to learn more about the product.

For example, in one implementation, the MR-Control server 220 mayprovide a HTTPS PUT message including the questionnaire 338 b in theform of data formatted according to the XML. Below is an example HTTP(S)PUT message including an XML-formatted questions 338 b to provide to theuser 233 a:

PUT /question.php HTTP/1.1 Host: www.TV.com Content-Type:Application/XML Content-Length: 718 <?XML version = “1.0” encoding =“UTF-8”?> <Question> <QuestionID> Q000123456789 </QuestionID><QuestionName> Automobile Inquiry </QuestionName> <TemplateType> static</TemplateType> <TemplateID> TD0001 </TemplateID> <QuestionDescription><body> ″What automobile brand would you like?″ </body> <Option1> A. BMW<Option1> <Ooption2> B. Audi </Option2> . . . </QuestionDescription><QuestionChannel> CBS </QuestionChannel> <QuestionMediaID> 123456789</QuestionMediaID> <QuestionGenre> Product Ad </QuestionGenre><QuestionPromptTime> 50′56″ </QuestionPromptTime> . . . </Question>

In one embodiment, upon receiving questions and/or ads at the mobiledevice, the user may submit a response 339 to the MR-Control server,e.g., an answer to the question, a click on the provided ad URL, and/orthe like. In another implementation, upon viewing an embeddedadvertisement while watching a TV program, the user 233 a may desire tolearn more or purchase the product, and submit a request of purchase 365a (e.g., by clicking on “Buy it Now” 750 c in FIG. 7G) to the MR-Controlserver 220. The MR-Control 220 may forward the purchase request 365 b toa merchant website 280, and redirect the user to view the merchant siteto obtain more information of the interested product. In oneimplementation, the MR-Control may log the user question responses,indication of interests, purchase transaction, and/or the like at thedatabase 219 to indicate ad effects.

For example, in one implementation, the MR-Control server 220 mayprovide a HTTPS PUT message including the questionnaire response 339 b,purchase request 365 a in the form of data formatted according to theXML. Below is an example HTTP(S) PUT message including an XML-formattedquestions responses/purchasing request to provide to the database 219:

PUT /responses.php HTTP/1.1 Host: www.MR-Control.com Content-Type:Application/XML Content-Length: 718 <?XML version = “1.0” encoding =“UTF-8”?> <Response> <ResponseID> R000123456789 </ResponseID><Timestamp> 19:00:00 </Timestamp> <Date> 09-09-xxxx </Date> <QuestionID>Q000123456789 </QuestionID> <QuestionName> Automobile Inquiry</QuestionName> <QuestionDescription> <body> ″What automobile brandwould you like?″ </body> <Option1> A. BMW <Option1> <Ooption2> B. Audi</Option2> . . . </QuestionDescription> . . . <QuestionResponse><UserID> JS001 <UserID> <UserName> John Smith </UserName <DeviceID>JSiPhone0002 </DeviceID> . . . <Response> B </Response></QuestionResponse> . . . </Response>

In further implementations, the MR-Control may populate social mediafeeds of the user's questionnaire responses/purchase information 365 bto a social media platform 250. In another implementation, the user mayshare purchase information 238 to the social media 250. For example, theuser's Facebook news feeds may comprise a message “XXX participated in asurvey. See her response” (e.g., see 731 c in FIG. 7C). The user mayalso obtain his friends' MR-Control activities, including participationin surveys, purchases 349, etc., from social media news feed.

FIG. 3B provides a logic flow diagram illustrating generating a surveyquestion within embodiments of the MR-Control. Within embodiments, uponuser submitting a channel selection 305, the MR-Control server may checkprogram table to determine what's on air on the selected channel 306,and retrieve a program table to obtain ads tagged in the selected TVprogram 307.

In one implementation, the MR-Control may parse commercial adinformation on the selected channel 308 a, to extract key terms. Forexample, in one implementation, the MR-Control may retrieve theadvertised product brand name, product name, category, etc. In oneimplementation, the MR-Control may query on a questionnaire databasebased on the parsed ad key terms 310. For example, for an “Audi”commercial, the MR-Control may parse key terms as “Audi,” “car,”“automobile,” and select and generate pop-up questions related to suchkey terms to the user 312.

In another implementation, the MR-Control may incorporate a variety ofuser media content exposure data to generate media content based surveyquestions 308 b. For example, MR-Control may incorporate mobile adsexposure data (e.g., user web visits, MR-Control generated mobile ads,etc.), user application status (e.g., browsing history, Internet gamingcontent, etc.), social content (e.g., social pages, social ads, friends'recommendations, user' likes, etc.) 305 b, and/or the like. In oneimplementation, the MR-Control may receive the various user contentexposure data from a MR-Control client component instantiated on theuser mobile device, e.g., an iPhone app, etc. In another implementation,the MR-Control may receive mobile data from a mobile meter, a proxyserver, a TV metering system, and/or the like.

In one implementation, the MR-Control may generate synchronized pop-upsurvey questions to the user. For example, in one implementation, theMR-Control may analyze the ad tags prior to the TV program on air, andprepare pop-up questions associated with each ad tag. The generatedpop-up questions may be sent to the user according to the timetable ofthe ad tags. In another implementation, the MR-Control may retrieve theuser's viewing history, e.g., the TV programs the user has recentlywatched, etc., and determine the ads associated with the TV programs theuser has watched to generate non-synchronized pop-up survey questions.

Upon receiving the pop-up survey question 313, the user may elect tosubmit a response 315, which may indicate ad effects. In furtherimplementations, the survey questions may be generated based onadvertisement the user has exposed to (e.g., via cross-channel admeasurement, as further illustrated in FIG. 7E), social media contents,and/or the like.

FIG. 3C provides a logic flow diagram illustrating generating productplacement ads within embodiments of the MR-Control. In oneimplementation, continuing on with retrieving ad tags in the TV programon air on the user selected channel 307, the MR-Control server may queryon what ads are available 328 in an ad database. For example, theMR-Control may obtain a list of ad tags and it associated types, whethera screen shot for product placement is available, etc. In oneimplementation, if there is a synchronized ad tag 330, the MR-Controlmay prepare synchronized ad generation prior to the timestamp of the adtag 333. In one implementation, MR-Control may determine an ad type 335,e.g., whether it is static ad or interactive ad. In one implementation,if it is a static ad, the MR-Control may select a static ad template andpopulate the product information into the template, and provide atextual pop-up ad at a synchronized time 340 to the user. In anotherimplementation, if the ad tag indicates an interactive ad is available,MR-Control may retrieve a tagged screenshot associated with theinteractive ad tag. For another implementation, the MR-Control maygenerate a video frame grab comprising the product placement tags 338via video frame grabbing software (e.g., Windows Media Player, QuicktimePlayer, etc.). In one implementation, the MR-Control may retrieve aninteractive ad template and populate the video frame into the templateto provide the interactive ad (e.g., see FIG. 7G) at a synchronized time342 to the user.

In one implementation, if the TV program at the user submitted channelcontains no synchronized ad tags 330, the MR-Control may elect not tosend ads/questions to the user. In another implementation, theMR-Control may retrieve user's recent viewing history (e.g., the pastweek, etc.), and generate a non-synchronized ad/survey question to theuser based on the user's recently viewed TV programs. In furtherimplementations, the MR-Control may re-send ads that were synchronizedwith one of user's recently viewed TV programs to the user.

In further implementations, the synchronized product placement ads maybe applied to in-game ads in a similar manner. For example, theMR-Control may determine a user is engaging in a gaming application viathe received device application event (e.g., 241 in FIG. 2B), anddeliver an interactive advertisement of related virtual goods, e.g.,gaming points, widget, etc., to the user mobile device.

FIG. 3D shows a logic flow diagram illustrating ad synchronizationquestion message processing (e.g., 289 c) within embodiments of theMR-Control. Within embodiments, upon receiving a message from a user anddetermining the type of the message as an ad/question response 289 c,the MR-Control may determine whether the received message comprise aresponse to a survey question 362.

In another implementation, if the received message comprises responsesto prompt questions 362, the MR-Control may determine a classificationof the question 365, e.g., a response to survey, a response to embeddedadvertisement, and/or the like. In another implementation, the questionresponses may be classified by the products, e.g., automobiles,apparels, electronics, and/or the like. In one implementation, theMR-Control may extract a questionnaire ID and/or a survey ID 366 fromthe received user response, and store the questionnaire results 368associated matched with the questionnaire based on an ID query.

In a further implementation, the user who responds to questionnaires maybe credited for a reward. For example, after obtaining and storingquestionnaire results, the MR-Control may determine rewards for the user370, e.g., five MR-Control points for each question answered, etc., andcredit the points to the user's MR-Control account 372. In anotherimplementations, the rewards may comprise virtual currency (e.g., storepoints, gaming points, etc.), coupons, discounts, and/or the like,sponsored by an advertising merchant.

In another implementation, when the MR-Control determines the responsedoes not comprise a response to a survey question at 362, the MR-Controlmay determine whether it comprises an interactive activity indication376. For example, a user may submit a rating of the product with theinteractive ad, click on the interactive ad, and/or the like. In oneimplementation, if the user submits a purchase request 378, theMR-Control may provide a merchant URL, and/or direct the user to amerchant page to proceed with purchase transaction 377 a. The MR-Controlmay log user activities associated with the product placementadvertisement 377 b, e.g., with an ad ID, etc.

In one implementation, the MR-Control may aggregate data analysisresults from all different types of messages received from the user andrun aggregate analytics 375 for ad effects. FIG. 3E provides a logicflow diagram illustrating ad delivery/effects analysis withinembodiments of the MR-Control. For example, in one implementation,MR-Control may obtain a correlation of an advertisement and userperception of the product, based on responses to the survey question(e.g., if a user selects “Audi” in an automobile survey, after viewingan “Audi” advertisement, etc.). In further implementation, MR-Controlmay generate an ad effect score for each advertisement.

In one implementation, MR-Control may retrieve an advertisement anddetermine an ad classification 380, e.g., a category of the advertisedproduct (e.g., apparel, accessories, automobile, electronics, etc.). Forexample, for an “Audi” advertisement, the MR-Control may query forstored questions (e.g., 368 in FIG. 3D) results with the adclassification “automobile” 381. If such survey responses are available382, the MR-Control may query the retrieved survey responses formentions of the product 383, e.g., on a brand name “Audi,” on a make andmodel of the “Audi” automobile, etc. For each response, the MR-Controlmay determine a relevance of the question and question results 382. Forexample, the MR-Control may retrieve the corresponding question with thequestion results based on a question ID (e.g., stored at in FIG. 3E),and perform text analytics to determine a relevance level of thequestion to the brand name product “Audi” automobile (e.g., based onwhether the question contains key terms such as “preference,” “carpurchase,” etc.). In one implementation, the MR-Control may determine anad effect weight value for the response 385. For example, the MR-Controlmay perform text analytics of the question and questions results, and ifthe textual question/question results contain key terms such as “carpurchase” and “Audi,” such response may be accorded with a high weightvalue. In one implementation, the weighting value determination at 385may be based on a pre-stored weight evaluation table, e.g., 0.5 forsubmitting a response of “Audi,” 0.8 for clicking on a merchant site,50.0 for transacting a sale on an “Audi” automobile,” etc., andcalculate an impact score of the advertisement based on a group of users(e.g., see 1019I at FIG. 10). The MR-Control may generate an ad effectsub-score based on analytics of user survey responses 386 a, e.g.,taking a weighted sum, etc.

In another implementation, the MR-Control may query for stored useractivities (e.g., stored at 377 b in FIG. 3D) in response to an ad(e.g., purchasing request, click for more information, etc.) base on anad ID 382. If such activities are available 387, the MR-Control maydetermine a type of the activity 388, e.g., clicks on the ad for moreinformation, clicks on a provided merchant URL, user rating of theadvertised product, clicks on “Buy It Now,” closing the ad withoutbrowsing, and/or the like. Based on the activity type, the MR-Controlmay associate a weight value for the activity 389, and generate an adeffect sub-score based on analytics of user activities 386 b, e.g.,taking a weighted sum, etc. For example, a click on a merchant URL maybe accorded with a high positive weight value; and a prompt window closeof the ad may be accorded with a low or zero weight value, and/or thelike. In one implementation, the MR-Control may generate an indicationof ad effects 390 based on an integrated ad effects score (e.g., takinga sum of the subscores from 386 a and 387 b, etc.).

In one implementation, MR-Control may compare the ad effects score ofthe same ad on different media channel, to determine efficiency of thead placement. For example, if the same “Audi” ad has a higher impactscore on channel “ESPN” than “Disney,” it may provide heuristics to themerchant that such advertisement is more efficient on “ESPN.” In furtherimplementations, MR-Control may determine efficiency of the time and theTV program to place the advertisement based on the ad effects score.

FIG. 4A provides a block diagram illustrating a MR-Control clientcomponent 401 within embodiments of the MR-Control. Within embodiments,a MR-Control component 401 may contain a number of sub-components and/ordata stores. A MR-Control client controller 405 may serve a central rolein some embodiments of MR-Control operation, serving to orchestrate thereception, generation, and distribution of data and/or instructions to,from and between client mobile device(s) and/or the server viaMR-Control components and in some instances mediating communicationswith external entities and systems.

In one embodiment, the MR-Control controller 405 and/or the differentcomponents may be instantiated on a user mobile device, e.g., an AppleiPhone, etc. In an alternative embodiment, the controller may be housedseparately from other components and/or databases within the MR-Controlsystem, while in another embodiment, some or all of the other modulesand/or databases may be housed within and/or configured as part of theMR-Control controller. Further detail regarding implementations ofMR-Control controller operations, modules, and databases is providedbelow.

In one embodiment, the MR-Control controller 405 may be coupled to oneor more interface components and/or modules. In one embodiment, theMR-Control Controller may be coupled to a user interface (UI) 410. Theuser interface 410 may be configured to receive user inputs and displayapplication states and/or other outputs. The UI may, for example, allowa user to adjust MR-Control system settings, select communicationmethods and/or protocols, manually enter texts, engage mobile deviceapplication features, and/or the like. In one implementation, the userinterface 410 may include, but not limited to devices such as,keyboard(s), mouse, stylus(es), touch screen(s), digital display(s),and/or the like. In another implementation, the user questionnairecomponent 430 may provide user survey questions and receive userresponses via the user interface 410.

In one implementation, the MR-Control Controller 405 may further becoupled to a sensor module 420, configured to interface with and/orprocess signals from sensor input/output (I/O) components 425. Thesensor I/O components 425 may be configured to obtain information ofenvironmental conditions, and/or the like to generate atmospherics datathat may be received and/or processed by other MR-Control components. Awide variety of different sensors may be compatible with MR-Controloperation and may be integrated with sensor I/O components 425, such asbut not limited to a camera, an audio recorder, a GPS component, and/orthe like, configured to capture video clips/photos of what is playing onthe TV and/or whether the user is watching the program, audio recordingclips indicative of what is playing on the TV, GPS informationindicative of the user's location, and/or the like. In oneimplementation, the Media Listen-In Component 440 may configure,aggregate and packetize atmospherics data captured by the sensor modulecomponent 420 in a data format suitable for data transmission via thesensor I/O 425. In a further implementation, the Media Listen-InComponent 440 may process and analyze the obtained atmospherics data,e.g., a photo captured by the mobile device, etc., to identify whetherthe user is watching, and/or how many individuals are watching from thephoto, via image processing. For example, in one embodiment, the iPhoneSDK toolkit and/or runtime libraries may be installed and/or used toperform such image processing.

In one embodiment, the MR-Control Controller 405 may further be coupledto a communications module 430, configured to interface with and/orprocess data transmission from communications I/O components 435. Thecommunications I/O components 435 may comprise components facilitatingtransmission of electronic communications via a variety of differentcommunication protocols and/or formats as coordinated with and/or by thecommunications module 430. Communication I/O components 440 may, forexample, contain ports, slots, antennas, amplifiers, and/or the like tofacilitate transmission of TV program listing information, usersubmission of channel selection, user responses to survey questions,and/or the like, via any of the aforementioned methods. Communicationprotocols and/or formats for which the communications module 230 and/orcommunications I/O components 435 may be compatible may include, but arenot limited to, GSM, GPRS, W-CDMA, CDMA, CDMA2000, HSDPA, Ethernet,WiFi, Bluetooth, USB, and/or the like. In various implementations, thecommunication I/O 435 may, for example, serve to configure data intoapplication, transport, network, media access control, and/or physicallayer formats in accordance with a network transmission protocol, suchas, but not limited to FTP, TCP/IP, SMTP, Short Message Peer-to-Peer(SMPP) and/or the like. The communications module 430 and communicationsI/O 435 may further be configurable to implement and/or translateWireless Application Protocol (WAP), VoIP and/or the like data formatsand/or protocols. The communications I/O 435 may further house one ormore ports, jacks, antennas, and/or the like to facilitate wired and/orwireless communications with and/or within the MR-Control system. Forexample, the communication I/O 432 may be extended by a plug-inaccessory as shown at 120 in FIG. 1.

Numerous data transfer protocols may also be employed as MR-Controlconnections, for example, TCP/IP and/or higher protocols such as HTTPpost, FTP put commands, and/or the like. In one implementation, thecommunications module 430 may comprise web server software equipped toconfigure application state data for publication on the World Wide Web.Published application state data may, in one implementation, berepresented as an integrated video, animation, rich internetapplication, and/or the like configured in accordance with a multimediaplug-in such as Adobe Flash. In another implementation, thecommunications module 430 may comprise remote access software, such asCitrix, Virtual Network Computing (VNC), and/or the like equipped toconfigure user application (e.g., a user mobile device). In anotherimplementation, the communications module 430 may transmit TV programlisting information to the real time TV remote control component 415,which may in turn receives user channel selection form the userinterface 410.

In further implementations, the MR-Control 405 may be configured tocommunicate with a content based embedded advertising component 420,media content questionnaire synchronization component 435, and/or thelike (as further discussed in FIGS. 3B and 3C).

FIG. 4B provides a combined logic and data flow diagram illustratingMR-Control client and server interactions within embodiment of theMR-Control. In one embodiment, the TV remote control component 415 maysubmit a channel selection event 416 to the MR-Control server 450, whichmay in turn query a media program database 419 for TV programinformation. For example, in one implementation, the MR-Control server450 may form a first query 417 on a media program table 419 a based onthe user's channel selection, to determine the TV program the user iswatching and send such program information 418 back to the user; and asecond query on an Ad Tags table 419 b to determine what advertisementand embedded product placement advertisement the user may receivedduring the TV program streaming. The queried results, including theprogram information and ad information, may be fed into an Adsynchronization component 455 at the MR-Control server 450, which maygenerate ad synchronization popup questions 421 based on the ad the usermay be watching.

In one implementation, the generated ad synchronization questions 421may be received and provided to the user via a user interface generatedby the user questionnaire component 430 on the user's mobile device,which may in turn provide user's response events 422 to an Ad effectengine component 460 at the MR-PLATOFRM server 450 to analyzeadvertisement effects.

In one embodiment, the media listen-in component 440 may collect andaggregate atmospherics data 423, e.g., video recording clips, audiorecording clips, photo streams, GPS information, and/or the like, to amedia viewing statistics analysis component 465, which may analyze themedia viewing data, and determine the audience reception rate of a TVprogram and/or advertisement.

In a further implementation, the social media connection component 445may generate and transmit social media post 448 indicating the user'sviewing status to a social media database 469, and may optionally sendthe social media post to the MR-Control 450 as well. In oneimplementation, the MR-Control server 450 may obtain the user's socialmedia status updates information, including friends' recommendations,comments, and/or the like via an API call 471 to the social mediadatabase 469. In another implementation, the MR-Control server 450 mayredirect a user to the social media website 472 from the user'sinstantiated MR-Control client component to engage in social mediaactivities. For example, the user may click on a social media link viathe MR-Control client component user interface and be redirected to thesocial media page.

FIG. 4C provides a block diagram illustrating an example infrastructureof a MR-Control table top unit component within implementations of theMR-Control. Within implementations, the table top device 473 may be astandalone device that may be placed on a desk, wherein the user may berequested to place it to face the screen of a TV set or the TV STB. Inone implementation, the table top device 473 may communicate with a usermobile device, a laptop computer, a desktop computer, and/or the like,via a Bluetooth transmitter/receiver interface 472-474. In oneimplementation via Bluetooth connection 476. a user may download andinstall a remote control mobile application 471. In anotherimplementation, the table top device 473 may communicate with a TV set483, a set top box 486, DVR equipment, and/or the like, via infraredtransmitter/receiver interfaces 475, 485/487 via infrared connection481. In one implementation, the table top device 473 may comprise arechargeable battery 478 for power supplies from charging inputs 480.

The table top device 473 may facilitate mobile remote control to operatein a similar manner as the MR-Control accessory 1120 in FIG. 1B. Insteadof being plugged into a user mobile device, the table top device 473 maycommunicate with a user device running the remote mobile application 471via wireless connections. For example, the table top device may beoperated for remote TV channel control, collecting atmospherics data foraudience monitoring, and/or the like. In further implementations, thetable top device may be positioned so that the table top device maycapture images from the screen of the TV set.

In one implementation, the table top device may be configured toperiodically monitor audio contents, video contents, etc., in theatmosphere, with or without having user input of a channel selection.For example, the table top device may record an audio/video clip ofmedia program being played, and send such audio/video clip (or generatea signature/hash based on sampling of the recorded audio/video mediacontent) to the MR-Control server, which may in turn determine what theuser is watching. Further implementations are discussed in FIG. 2E.

FIGS. 5A-5B provide combined data flow and logic flow diagramsillustrating data downloads from social media platforms withinimplementations of the MR-Control. Within implementations, MR-Controlmay obtain social media data to measure, and/or influence consumerconsumption of media and advertising. For example, MR-Control may tracksocial media discussion to obtain comments, mentions, responses relatedto an object under evaluation (e.g., a brand name product, a TV show,etc.). In one implementation, a user may befriend with panelists to“Friend” on Facebook, and/or allow a panelist on Twitter, wherein thepanelist may be a MR-Control personnel, and/or an avatar, etc. TheMR-Control may then obtain users' conversations, wall posts, pages ofbrands/products the user follows, products/content the user “like”,social advertising the user has been exposed to, clicks on pages, etc.,to obtain social media exposure data. In one implementation, theMR-Control may incorporate comments of representative panelists,identification of friends across panel, social activities profiling ofpanel, and/or the like.

In a further implementation, the MR-Control may track social mediacontent (e.g., Facebook and Twitter, etc.) of MR-Control consumers,e.g., users who has authorized MR-Control to access their social mediacontent. In one implementation, the MR-Control may link demographic,behavioral, and attitudinal data from the user's profile informationwith social media behavior. The social media data downloading may beobtained via API calls, as discussed in FIGS. 5A-5B.

In a further implementation, the MR-Control may recruit consumers (e.g.,Facebook, Twitter users who have allow MR-Control to access their socialcontent) as MR-Control panelists, e.g., by providing incentive rewardsto the users, etc. In one implementation, the MR-Control may track howsocial media messages propagate throughout a network of social mediausers (e.g., the recruited panelists, etc.), based on the profiles ofthe individuals. Such measures of connectivity may be analyzed tomeasure propagation of marketing communications.

In another implementation, each panelist may be associated with a socialmedia specific profile so that their social media activities may betracked to determine whether they are influencers in certain categories,disseminators of information, information consumers, and/or the like.For example, in one implementation, a panelist may be labeled as a “TheBig Bang Theory Fan Wiki,” so that users interested in the show “The BigBang Theory” may follow the panelist to obtain information of the showvia the panelist's posts, comments, and/or the like, related to “The BigBang Theory.”

In one implementation, individual social media profiles may beincorporated to assess advertising targeting performance, enableadvertisers to plan social media campaigns by targeting productinfluencers, and/or the like.

As shown in FIG. 5A, MR-Control server 220 may send an access request toa social media platform (e.g., Facebook, Twitter, Google+, etc.) foraccess to a user's profile information and social media content, e.g.,news feeds, posted photos, Tweets, comments, activities (“Likes,”“Dislikes,” etc.).

In one implementation, upon receiving the access request 505, the socialmedia 250 may generate and send a user authorization request 510 to theuser 233 a. For example, Facebook and/or Twitter may send an email tothe user 233 a, wherein the email may comprise an authorization linkdirecting the user to a MR-Control authorization page (e.g., as includedin the access request 505). In one implementation, the user 233 a may beaccess the included authorization link via a mobile application UI 511 a(e.g., see FIG. 8A), and/or a web based application UI 511 b (e.g., seeFIG. 8B). As shown in FIG. 8A, the user may click “Allow” to grantpermission of MR-Control to access the user's social media content. Infurther implementation, as shown at 827 in FIG. 8C, the user mayconfigure a scope of information the MR-Control may be allowed toaccess.

For example, in one implementation, the user's mobile application and/ora web-based application may generate a (Secure) HTTPS PUT authorizationmessage 515 including an application ID and permission indication forthe social media platform in the form of data formatted according to theXML. Below is an example HTTP(S) PUT message including the XML-formattedaccess authorization message provide to Facebook:

PUT /AccessRequest.php HTTP/1.1 Host: 172.16.244.1 Destination:www.Faceobook.com Content-Type: Application/XML Content-Length: 518<?XML version = “1.0” encoding = “UTF-8”?> <Authorization> <AuthID>00001 </AuthID> <Time> 0:00:00 >/Time> <Date> 1-12-XXXX </Date> <UserID>JDOE <UserID> <AppID> Mobile0001 </AppID> <Permission> Yes </Permission><scope> /* Name of Permission elements like User Age, Friends, Messages,Likes etc that MR-Control application may have access to*/ <UserProfile><UserName> Yes </UserName> <UserAge> Yes <UserAge> <UserDOB> Yes</UserDOB> <Work> Yes </Work> <Education> Yes </Education> <Pages> Yes<Pages> <Network> Yes </Network> . . . </UserProfile> <Friends> <Number>Yes </Number> <FriendsList> No </FriendsList> . . . </Friends><Activities> <PostsonWallSelf> Yes <PostsonWallSelf> <PostsonFriedsWall>No <PostsonFriendsWall> <OthersWallComments> No <OthersWallComments> . .. </Activities> . . . </scope> .. </Authorization>

In the above example, the authorization message to Facebook may compriseinformation as to the scope of information access, e.g., the user maypermit MR-Control to access the user “JDOE's” Facebook profile includinghis name, age, date of birth, work an education information, interestedpages, network, and/or the like; a number of friends of “JDOE,” but maynot access an exact friends list. The user may allow MR-Control toobtain “JDOE's” posts on his own wall, but may not permit access to hisposts on his friends' wall or friends' comments on his wall, and/or thelike.

In one implementation, the social media 250 may pass on the applicationID from the user's mobile or web application and generate a user token518 to MR-Control for confirmation of access permission. In oneimplementation, the MR-Control may determine when data update is needed520, e.g., the data update from social media may be performed on aperiodic basis (e.g., daily, weekly, etc.). The MR-Control server maygenerate a data request 522 together with the received userauthorization token (e.g., 518) and transmit to the social mediaplatform.

In one implementation, the data request 522 may be sent to the socialmedia platform via a user oAuth protocol, and comprise a MR-Controlapplication ID, and/or a user social media ID, and/or the like. Forexample, in one implementation, the MR-Control server 220 may provide a(Secure) HTTPS PUT message including a data request 522 for Facebook inthe form of data formatted according to the XML. Below is an exampleHTTP(S) PUT message including the XML-formatted access request provideto Facebook:

PUT /AccessRequest.php HTTP/1.1 Host: www.MR-Control.com Destination:www.Faceobook.com Content-Type: Application/XML Content-Length: 518<?XML version = “1.0” encoding = “UTF-8”?> <Request> <RequestID> 000001</RequestID> <TimeStamp> 00:00:00 </TimeStamp><Destination>www.Facebook.com </Destination> <UserID> JDOE </UserID><ClientID> ccccccc </ClientID> /* MR-Control Mobile Remote ApplicationId or web-based MR-Control Panel management App Id obtained afterregistering the application with Facebook*/ <RedirectURL>www.MR-Control.com/user?8989898988.com </RedirectURL> /* MR-Controlapplication URL where the user may be redirected after authorization*/<Content> /* Name of Permission elements like User Age, Friends,Messages, Likes etc that MR-Control application may have access to*/<UserProfile> <UserName> Yes </UserName> <UserAge> Yes <UserAge><UserDOB> Yes </UserDOB> <Work> Yes </Work> <Education> Yes </Education><Pages> Yes <Pages> <Network> Yes </Network> . . . </UserProfile><Friends> <Number> Yes </Number> <FriendsList> No </FriendsList> . . .</Friends> <Activities> <PostsonWallSelf> Yes <PostsonWallSelf><PostsonFriedsWall> No <PostsonFriendsWall> <OthersWallComments> No<OthersWallComments> . . . </Activities> . . . </Content> . . .</Request>

In the above example, the data request generated by MR-Control toFacebook may comprise a user ID “JDOE” indicating the request isdirected to Facebook information of the user “JDOE”; a client IDindicating the application (e.g., the MR-Control mobile application ID,etc.) indicating a source of the request; and a URL link which may beprovided to the user for authorization, e.g., a link that requests theuser to click a “OK” or “Cancel” button on the page to authorize or denyMR-Control to gain access to the user's Facebook content. The accessrequest may further comprise information as to the scope of informationaccess, e.g., MR-Control may request to access the user “JDOE's”Facebook profile including his name, age, date of birth, work aneducation information, interested pages, network, and/or the like. TheMR-Control may also request to obtain information of a number of friendsof “JDOE,” but may not request to access an exact friends list. TheMR-Control may further request to obtain “JDOE's” posts on his own wall,but may not request to obtain his posts on his friends' wall or friends'comments on his wall, and/or the like.

For another example, in one implementation, the MR-Control server 220may provide a (Secure) HTTPS PUT message including a data request 522for Twitter server in the form of data formatted according to the XML.Below is an example HTTP(S) PUT message including the XML-formattedaccess request provide to Twitter:

PUT /AccessRequest.php HTTP/1.1 Host: www.MR-Control.com Destination:www.twitter.com Content-Type: Application/XML Content-Length: 518 <?XMLversion = “1.0” encoding = “UTF-8”?> <Request> <RequestID> 000002</RequestID> <TimeStamp> 00:00:01 </TimeStamp> <Destination>www.Twitter.com </Destination> <UserID> JDOE </UserID><oauth_consumer_key> /* The Consumer Key for MR-Control RemoteApplication and/or MR-Control panel management obtained afterregistering the application with twitter*/ NNNNNNN </oauth_consumer_key><oauth_signature_method> /*The signature method that the consumer usedto sign the request*/ email </oauth_signature_method> <oauth_signature>/*The signature as defined in twitter signing requests> electronic</oauth_signature> <oauth_timestamp> /*Time stamp of authoroization*/00:00:02 </oauth_timestamp> <oauth_nonce> /* Unique string to identifyeach request*/ .8888ddddd </oauth_nonce> . . . </Request>

In the above example of data request to Twitter, the request maycomprise a user signature request. For example, a user may provideelectronic signature by clicking on a link (e.g., at 515, etc.) noting“I hereby provide my signature by pressing this button to allowMR-Control access my Twitter content,” etc.

In one implementation, upon verification of the data request byFacebook/Twitter/other social media platform, MR-Control server 220 maydownload social media structured data 525 a and unstructured data 525 b(e.g., see 571 a-b in FIG. 5B) for media analytics.

FIG. 5B shows a block diagram illustrating an example infrastructure mapof MR-Control media analytics within embodiments of the MR-Control. Inone implementation, MR-Control may provide a media analytics andreporting platform portal 570 for analyzing TV, Internet, mobile andsocial media data upon client request, e.g., analyzing public feedbacksand comments on a brand name products, TV shows, and/or the like. In oneimplementation, the media measurement and analytics portal platform 570may provide class visualization, self service administration withseamless integration between the different architectural components,e.g., 570 a and 570 b, etc.

In one embodiment, the MR-Control media measurement portal 570 may loaddata from social networks via a HTTP network 578 via API calls, e.g.,Facebook APPI 58 oa, Twitter API 580 b, Google+ API 580 c, and othersocial data providers 580 d. The media measurement portal 570 mayprocess the loaded data within different analytics platforms 570 a/bbased on loaded data types, e.g., structured data 571 a or unstructureddata 571 b.

For example, in one implementation, structured data 571 a may be alreadystored in a structured format when loaded from the data source, such as,but not limited to user TV channel selection indication with timestamp,web displaying content with timestamp, social media user profileinformation, a number of user's social connections (time stamped), aposted photo on social media platform with timestamp, and/or the like.For example, an exemplary XML record of structured Facebook user profiledata 571 a downloaded from Facebook may take a form similar to thefollowing:

PUT /userprofile.php HTTP/1.1 Host: www.MR-Control.com Content-Type:Application/XML Content-Length: 718 <?XML version = “1.0” encoding =“UTF-8”?> <User> <UserID> JDoe </UserID> <UserFirstName> John<//UserFirstName> <UserMI> Null </UserMI> <UserLastName> Doe</UserLastName> <UserProfilePhoto> Me.JPG </UserProfilePhoto><WorkandEducation> <Employers1> <EmployerName> Data Inc.<EmpoyerName><StartTime> 2006 </StartTime> <EndTime> present </EndTime> . . .</Employers> <College> Good University </College> <Classyear> 2000</ClassYear> . . . </WorkandEducation> . . . <Interests> <Interests1>Graduate Program </Interests1> <Interests2> Cool Cars </Interests2></Interests> . . . <Friends> <Number> 82 </Number> <List> Lisa Smith; .. . </List> . . . </Friends> . . . <User>

In one implementation, the analytics platform for processing structureddata may store the structured data, such as TV channel selection,mobile/web content data, social network user profile data, etc. in adatabase 575 a.

For another example, unstructured data 571 b may comprise raw textdownloaded from social media platform, e.g., friends' comments fromFacebook, original Tweets, etc. In one implementation, MR-Control socialanalytics platform 570 b may perform data mining on unstructured data571 b to measure user feedbacks of a brand name product, TV program,etc. For example, a query may be performed on the unstructured data 571b to determine how many mentions of “The Big Bang Theory” are posted byFacebook users.

For example, in one implementation, an exemplary XML record ofunstructured Facebook user message 571 b downloaded from Facebook maytake a form similar to the following:

PUT /usercomments.php HTTP/1.1 Host: www.MR-Control.com Content-Type:Application/XML Content-Length: 718 <?XML version = “1.0” encoding =“UTF-8”?> <SocialMessage> <UserID> JDoe </UserID> <UserFirstName> John<//UserFirstName> <UserMI> Null </UserMI> <UserLastName> Doe</UserLastName> <MessageID> 00001 </MessageID> <Time> 19:00:45 </Time><Date> 09-09-2011 </Date> <SocialType> Like </SocialType> <Object><Type> Facebook Page </Type> <Name> Big Bang Theory </Name> <Category>TV </Category> <Genre> Comedy </Genre> . . . </Object> <ActivityTime>14:33:56 </ActivityTime> <ActivityDate> 09-09-2011 </ActivityDate> . . .</User>

For further implementations, the unstructured data 571 b may comprise asocial post, a social media check-in status, social mentions, and/or thelike.

In one implementation, the MR-Control structured data analytics platformcomprises a variety of processing components, such as but not limited touser permission component for social media access 573 a, TV/mobile/webmeasurement reports component 573 b, media analytics engine 573 c,organization/user account management component 573 d, single source dataextraction, transformation and load (ETL) component 573 e, and/or thelike. Within implementations, the user permission component may presentpanel users with a set of user interface screens requesting them toprovide permission for MR-Control to access their social content. Forexample, MR-Control may provide incentives of promotional rewards,points, coupons and/or the like to users during questionnairedistribution (e.g., MR-Control mobile questionnaires 238 a, etc) toallow MR-Control access to their social content.

In one implementation, if the user agrees to provide the access to theirsocial content, the permission component 573 a may get the authorizationtoken from the respective social platforms (Facebook, twitter etc) asper the authorization protocol and persist the token in a repository 575b. The user permission component 573 a may pass the user token and otherapplication authorization details to social analytics platform so thatthe user's social content can be extracted at a scheduled frequency. Forexample, MR-Control may periodically, constantly and/or intermittentlyload social content data from the social media platforms via API callsonce authentication is established. Further implementations of userpermission flows are discussed in FIGS. 5A-5B.

In one implementation, the media analytics engine 573 c may analyze theloaded structured data 573 c, e.g., per user profile, per media type,etc. In one implementation, the organization/user management 573 d maycreate and manage user accounts with the MR-Control. In furtherimplementations, the TV/mobile/web measurement reports component 573 bmay generate media measurement reports (e.g., including audienceratings, ad effectiveness, etc.) based on structured media data, such asaudience TV channel selections, mobile/web browsing activities, etc.

In one implementation, the MR-Control unstructured data analyticsplatform 570 b may have a rule to define the specific fields for whichthe content needs to be extracted for a given user (e.g. userdemographics, no of friends, no of messages in a given duration, actualtext for message and comments etc). Based on the authentication tokenthe social media analytics platform 570 b may query the social platformfor the content. In one implementation, the social analytics platform570 b may schedule the query tasks and persist structured andunstructured content that is extracted.

In one implementation, the MR-Control social analytics platform 570 bmay comprise a variety of processing components, such as but not limitedto, social media measurement reports component 583 a, taxonomymanagement console 583 b, text analytics engine 583 c, social mediaadapters 583 d, social analytics platform API 583 e, and/or the like.The social analytics platform API 583 e may exchange data via API calls587 with the single source ETL process component 573 e, such as userauthorization tokens, and/or the like.

In one implementation, the taxonomy management console 583 b may definetaxonomy tags and taxonomy logic rules. For example, the taxonomy may bedefined at three different levels: a standard taxonomy specific to anindustry and business function as provided by the platform vendor (e.g.,tagging a unstructured data record by industry, etc.); taxonomy definedby analyst and subject matter experts (e.g., MR-Control analyticsdefined taxonomy rules, etc.); and/or taxonomy defined by clients,and/or the like. For example, for a Tweet “Good adaption of the SouthernVampire series. Love the CBS actors/actresses. Expecting the new season”(e.g., 185 in FIG. 1D), the text analytics engine 583 c may apply ataxonomy rule to tag it by a hierarchy of tags “TV show->CBS->The BigBang Theory->Positive Feedback.” For another example, the client (e.g.,CBS, etc.) may desire to categorize the commented target of the Tweet,and therefore the taxonomy rule may comprise an additional sub-category“actor/actresses,” and/or the like. In one implementations, suchtaxonomy rules may be stored in a repository 585 a, and the originalsocial text data and social graph, tagged social data may be stored at585 b. Further implementations and applications of the taxonomy rulesare discussed in FIGS. 5E-5F.

In one implementation, the social media measurement reports 583 a mayprovide a user feedback measurement report to a user via UI integrationand data visualization. Within implementations, the reporting portal 583a may leverage the web based visual components (e.g. word cloud, trafficlight components etc) provided by the social media analytics platform570 for analysis that deliver insights purely on social media data. Infurther implementations, for insights generated on combined data setfrom social and other data sources (e.g., via data mesh-up 572 betweenthe structured data analytics platform 570 a and unstructured dataanalytics platform 570 b, etc.) the taxonomy management console 583 bmay be integrated to an integrated reporting portal to ensure theclients have the self service capability of defining the taxonomy andbuilding the reports. For example, single sign on and UI widget meshup572 may be adopted between the two platforms 570 a and 570 b forintegration of the two.

In one implementation, the MR-Control media measurement portal 570 maycombine structured social media data with other data sources to generatecross media insights. The social media analytics platform 570 b may havethe API to extract data for predefined metrics and attributes (e.g.,taxonomy logics, data tags, etc.). The metrics and attributes may bepredefined in the social media analytics tool to compute from thestructured and unstructured content extracted from the social mediaplatforms.

In one implementation, the MR-Control media measurement portal 570 mayuse different platforms for social media reporting and structured datareporting, and have a tight integration at the data and UI layers ofboth the platforms. Additional implementations of the MR-Control mediameasurement portal 570 may comprise: out of the box connectors forsocial media platforms like Facebook, Twitter, Google+, etc (e.g., at583 e, etc.); web based taxonomy creation and management userinterfaces; industry specific prebuilt taxonomies (e.g., at 583 b,etc.); text analytics engine with sentiment analysis with learningalgorithms (e.g., at 583 c, etc.); ability to define fields for whichsocial content needs to be extracted (e.g., at 583 c, etc.); data APIcalls to extract large data set in and out of the platform in real timeand/or in batch mode (e.g., at 583 d, etc.); data API calls for UIwidget integration to create mesh-up (e.g., at 572, etc.); multipletenant support to ensure taxonomies defined at organization anddepartment level (e.g., at 583 b, etc.); single sign on support withactive directory service interfaces (ADSI) and other light weightdirectory access protocol (LDAP) providers (e.g., at 572, 573 a, etc.);components to generate insights from large historical data (e.g., overtwo terabytes of data); components to schedule data extraction jobs fromsocial media sites (e.g., at 583 e, etc.); components to support to hostthe service on a cloud, and/or the like.

FIG. 5C provide a logic flow diagram of user authorization for socialmedia access and social message (e.g., 289 d at FIG. 2C) processingwithin implementations of the MR-Control. In one embodiment, uponreceiving a social message from a user, the MR-Control may determinewhether the user, and/or the MR-Control is authorized to send socialmessages to the user's social media platform.

In one implementation, the user 233 a may allow MR-Control platform toaccess to their social network. For example, in one implementation, theuser 233 a may sign up for MR-Control permission via a MR-Control mobileapplication 511 a from a mobile device (e.g., an Apple iPhone, anAndroid, etc.). For another example, the user 233 a may visit aMR-Control social data panel management website 511 b (e.g., asillustrated in one example in FIG. 8B). In each case, MR-Control mayprovide a sign up link to a social media platform to the user. Upon userclicking the link, the MR-Control may verify whether the user previouslyauthorized 532 a/b MR-Control to access their Facebook or Twitterinformation on their behalf and their previous authorization token(e.g., 522 in FIG. 5A) is not expired.

In another implementation, the MR-Control may receive user attempts tolog in and determine whether the user is authorized 532 a/b to grantsocial media data access permission for MR-Control. For example, when auser has received an email from a social media platform (e.g., Facebook,Twitter, etc.) comprising a MR-Control link for authentication and theuser clicks the link to proceed to grant permissions for MR-Control, theuser may deemed authorized to configure social media permissions viaMR-Control. In another implementation, when MR-Control determines theuser is not authorized, MR-Control may redirect the user to a socialmedia page 533 a/b with a MR-Control application ID and a permissionattribute request, e.g., as discussed at 515 in FIG. 5A.

In one implementation, the MR-Control may determine whether access isapproved by the user, e.g., the user may select “Yes” or “Cancel” toindicate permission decision for MR-Control to access the user's socialmedia content when the social media platform sent an email notificationindicating the access request from MR-Control, e.g., at 515 in FIG. 5A.

For example, if the previous authorization is not valid or if it is afirst time access then the MR-Control application may use oAuth protocolto request Facebook or Twitter to provide access to user profile andmessages (e.g., sending an access request 505 as shown in FIG. 5A). Insuch cases, the user may be redirected to Facebook or Twitter web sitewith request to log in and provide access parameters, e.g., see 515 inFIG. 5A, and 827 in FIG. 8C. Facebook or Twitter web site may present alogin and permission screen with option to allow or deny requestedaccess to MR-Control (e.g., see 810 at FIG. 8A).

In one implementation, if the user approves the access request then inthe response Facebook or Twitter may provide an authentication tokenassociated with permission to the data elements (e.g., 518 at FIG. 5A).In one implementation, the authentication tokens may be requested withconstant permission to allow user data access even when the user isneither logged into MR-Control user portal (e.g., the mobile app 511 aor the web based app 511 b) nor any social media platform. Inalternative implementations, the authentication token may request timelyupdate and re-authentication from user on a periodic basis, e.g.,weekly, monthly, etc. In further implementations, the user may revokeaccess of MR-Control from to their social media account if they wish toopt out.

If the user granted the permission, MR-Control may save theauthorization response token provided by the social media platform in auser repository 535 a/b. The authentication token may be used in allsubsequent requests to social networking sites to access user's dataelements. In another implementation, if the user did not grantpermission, the user may continue with the mobile application or the webbased panel management website 536 a/b.

Upon establishing and/or confirm user authorization for social mediaaccess, MR-Control server may generate social messages to populate tosocial media platforms via MR-Control 537, e.g., see 275 b in FIG. 2A,365 b in FIG. 3A, etc.

FIG. 5D provides a logic flow diagram illustrating data download fromsocial media within implementations of the MR-Control. Continuing onwith 9 at FIG. 5A, MR-Control may receive data updates from the socialmedia servers 540. The MR-Control may determine a source of the socialmedia data 543, e.g., Facebook, Twitter, Google+, and/or the like, andapply data format analytics rules based on the determined data source545.

For example, if the data record is obtained from Facebook, the dataformat analytics may determine whether it is structured user profileinformation, a user posted photo, unstructured user posting on the wall,others' comments, and/or the like. For another example, if the datarecord is obtained from Twitter, the MR-Control may determine whether itcomprises raw text of a Tweet, and/or the like.

In one implementation, if the received data is structured 538,MR-Control may parsing the structured data to extract information 552.For example, a structured user profile data record may be parsed perdata field, e.g., user_id, user_name, user_DOB, user_interests, and/orthe like. The MR-Control may generate a data record including userID/timestamp/geo source, etc. 555 and store the data record for thestructured data 557 at a database (e.g., see 575 a in FIG. 5B).

In another implementation, if the received data is unstructured 538,e.g., raw texts of Facebook comments, Tweets, etc., MR-Control may feedthe data to a Taxonomy engine for data tagging 560, as furtherillustrated in FIGS. 6A-6C.

FIGS. 5E-5F provide example data structures of social media data updateswithin embodiments of the MR-Control. For example, the data segments inFIGS. 5E-5F show database structure of social data elements associatedwith a user, wherein various data fields may be linked by a user ID,e.g., “USER TBL ID.”

Within implementations, a MR-Control analytics platform (e.g., 570 atFIG. 5C) may extract and use different sets of data elements from a usersocial media profile. For example, in one implementation, as shown inFIG. 5E-5F, a data record of a Facebook user profile may comprise datafields such as user work information, user education information,television viewing history, interested music, interested books, datafeeds, likes, status message, comments on status message, wall postedcomments, check-in history, and/or the like.

In one implementation, data elements are categorized based upon howfrequently they are updated and MR-Control may accordingly determine thefetch and refresh schedules. For example, the categorization maycomprise users static descriptors, such as user demographic attributeslike date of birth, gender, etc., which may be relatively “constant” and“static, and thus may be determined to scheduled to update every 6months. For another example, the categorization may comprise dynamicdescriptors, such as number of friends, Likes, television viewing, booksand other preferences, which may be updated by a Facebook user morefrequently, and may be scheduled for updates monthly. For anotherexample, the categorization may comprise text messages, status, comment,messages, posts, etc., and may be scheduled to update daily and/or ondemand. In one implementation, MR-Control may specify the requestedcontent in a data request accordingly, e.g., for user descriptors only,for dynamic descriptor only, for text messages only, and/or anycombination of the above. (e.g., see the “RequestedContent” field in theexample Facebook data request 522 in FIG. 5A).

FIG. 6A provides a logic flow diagram illustrating social mediaanalytics within embodiments of the MR-Control. In one embodiment, auser may submit a request for media analytics 605, e.g., for a brandname product, a TV program, and/or the like. For example, a TVproduction company may desire to know audience comments about their TVprogram (e.g., see FIG. 1D). The MR-Control server 220, upon receivingthe user request, may generate a media analytics management panel userinterface screen including a list of analytics options (e.g., see FIG.8C) 610, and the user may submit media analytics parameters 613. Forexample, as shown in FIG. 8D, the MR-Control management panel may allowa user to select social media source (e.g., Facebook, Twitter, Google+,and/or the like), a time range, feedback activity type, and/or the like.

In one implementation, MR-Control server 220 may download social mediadata updates (e.g., as discussed in FIGS. 5A-5C), and form a query basedon the retrieved social media data 615 based on the user inquiry. Forexample, when the producer CBS would like to know audience feedbacks ofthe show “The Big Bang Theory” (e.g., see FIG. 1D), MR-Control maysearch for data related to “The Big Bang Theory” on the retrievedupdated social media data.

For example, in one implementation, MR-Control may form a query on thestructured data based on key word “The Big Bang Theory” and/or anycharacter names and/or actors/actress names for the associated profiles,e.g., a Facebook pages, Twitter profiles, and obtain a number offollowers from the structured data. In another example, MR-Control mayform a query based on the key term “The Big Bang Theory” and obtain rawtext comments containing the key term. In one implementation, MR-Controlmay perform a progressive search over the raw text (e.g., unstructureddata, etc.). For example, MR-Control may search for “The Big BangTheory,” and then refine the search results by “The Big Bang Theory ANDCBS,” and refine the search results by “The Big Bang Theory AND CBS ANDShow,” and/or the like. In one implementation, MR-Control may search theunstructured data based on data tags associated therewith, as furtherdiscussed in FIGS. 6B-6C.

In one implementation, MR-Control may obtain query results 620, whichmay comprise a number of followers on the social media platform, aseries of raw text comments from the social media, and/or the like. TheMR-Control may then determine a presentation format 623 to provide theresults to the user. For example, when the user elects to choose “rawtexts” (e.g., see 850 in FIG. 8D), the user may view a list of raw textcomments 630 (e.g. see 850 a/b in FIG. 8D). In another implementation,MR-Control may select an output visualization format and present thevisualization of query results to the user 625, and the user may viewvisualized results 633 (e.g., see 860 a-c in FIG. 8E).

FIGS. 6B-6C provide logic flow diagrams illustrating example taxonomytagging logics within embodiments of the MR-Control. In oneimplementation, as discussed in FIG. 5C, unstructured data (e.g., rawtexts of Facebook comments, Tweets, and/or the like) may be parsed andtagged with category tags by a taxonomy engine (e.g., see 583 b-383 c inFIG. 5C).

In one implementation, MR-Control may apply taxonomy model logics, whichmay comprise any of a first logical section associated with the semanticcategorization of keywords and a second logical section associated withthe sentiment keywords. In one implementation, the taxonomy may assignweighted scores to the logical tagging in conjunction with the semantictext.

For example, in one implementation, the semantic categorization logicmay be hierarchical and specific to a domain to maintain simplicity ofin model management and run time executions, e.g. a specific taxonomymodel for TV shows, a specific taxonomy model for advertisement andbrand mentions, a taxonomy model for any combination of the above,and/or the like.

FIG. 6B shows an example TV shows semantic categorization model withinimplementations of the MR-Control. In one implementation, unstructureddata related to TV shows will be tagged with “TV shows” 640 as a level otag, and progressively be tagged with level 1, 2, 5, etc based on genre641, show names 642, show network 643 a, show episodes 643 b, show castmember name 643 c, show character names 643 d, show episode names 643 e,other keyword texts in the descriptor 643 f and/or the like. Forexample, the example Tweet 185 in FIG. 1D, “The Big Bang Theory is agood adaption of the Southern Vampires series. Love the CBSactors/actresses. Expecting the new season,” may be tagged as “TVshow”->“Soap” (genre)->“Comedy” (sub-genre)->“The Big Bang Theory” (showname), “CBS” (network), “new season” (episode), “geeks” (key words indescriptor), and/or the like.

FIG. 6C shows an example advertisement brand awareness model withinimplementations of the MR-Control. In one implementation, unstructureddata related to an advertised and/or brand product may be tagged with“all categories” 645 as a level o tag, and progressively be tagged withlevel 1, 2, 5, etc based product categories 646, product brand 647, adcontent key words 648 a, brand name 648 b, brand name+ad content keywords 648 c, product mentions 648 d, product name/type/model 648 e, keyword text in descriptor 648 f, and/or the like. For example, in oneimplementation, a Facebook wall post “the new Audi R8 commercial is socool!” may be tagged as “Consumer Products” (allcategories)->“Automobiles” (categories)->“Audi” (brand)->“R8” (productmodel), “commercial” (ad content), “so cool” (product mention/feedback),and/or the like.

FIG. 6D provides an example logic flow diagram illustrating taxonomytree definition within embodiments of the MR-Control. Withinembodiments, the taxonomy logic rules may be pre-defined by MR-Controlpanel experts using structured data dictionaries. In one implementation,the MR-Control may determine the “low level” categories based onstructured data dictionaries 650. For example, in one implementation,the TV show model may be designed based on a TV program guide to ensurethe reporting label and naming is followed. In this way, the taxonomymay accelerate and automate the model development process.

The MR-Control may extract sample text 653 for a TV show from socialmedia by a text miner (e.g., the text analytics engine 583 c in FIG. 5C)to identify most commonly used key words by the social media users. Forexample, user comments posted on the Facebook page of “The Big BangTheory” (e.g., see 186 b in FIG. 1D) may be sampled to extract keywords; if words such as “Werewolf” (characters), “Bontemp” (fictionaltown in the story), etc., are frequently used in the comments, thetaxonomy engine may adopt these words for taxonomy tags, e.g., the keyword text in descriptor (see 643 f in FIG. 6B). This process may enrichthe dictionary and provide inputs to defining taxonomy rules. TheMR-Control may be associated with the identified key words with a levelfor the tagging 655. For example, in one implementation, the keywordsidentified from sampled social media raw texts (e.g., Tweets, Facebookposts, etc.) may be associated with appropriate nodes, e.g., level 0, 1,2, 5, etc.

In a further implementation, MR-Control may identify keywords set foreach TV show/topic including words spelled differently but meant torefer the same entity 657 to expand the query scope, e.g. “COCA-COLA,”“COCA-COLA′S,” “COKE,” “COKE′S,” “COCA COLA,” “COCACOLA,” etc. Withinimplementations, a variety of logical combination of such key words maybe coded as a logical rule 660 with AND, 80R, Not operator, e.g.

Coke (Level 0) [ coke + good] | [ coke + excellent] (Level 1) [ coke +good] | [ coke + awesome] (Level 1) [ coke in advert + too much taste tocall zero] (Level2) . . .

wherein the “+” is an AND operator and “|” is an OR operator. TheMR-Control may establish a taxonomy tree combining the rules and storethe generated logic taxonomy tree in a taxonomy database (e.g., see 585a in FIG. 5C).

FIGS. 6E-6F provides an example logic flow illustrating taxonomy logicrule application within embodiments of the MR-Control. In oneembodiment, continuing on with 552 in FIG. 5C, e.g., upon receivingunstructured data for analytics and tagging, etc., MR-Control may parsethe unstructured data for a first level analytics, e.g., whether it isrelated to a TV show, and/or a brand product 680, and may generate afirst tag associated with the unstructured data with a brand name 682 byquerying on each brand in the brand database 684. The MR-Control maythen retrieve a taxonomy logic tree for the brand “Coke” 686, as shownin the above example.

In one implementation, MR-Control may follow the taxonomy tree for“Coke,” forming a query on a second category, e.g., brand name andpositive mentions 690. In the above example, the taxonomy tree may applya query on “Coke+Good” etc. If such text is found, MR-Control maygenerate a sub tag associated with the unstructured data with“Coke+good” 693 a. If not, the MR-Control may apply the taxonomy for analternative query key terms, e.g., “Coke+Excellent” 693 b, and/or thelike. Similarly, if that is found, MR-Control may generate a sub tag“Coke Excellent” with the unstructured data 695.

Continuing on with FIG. 6F, the taxonomy engine may progressively queryon “Coke” and key word texts, e.g., “too much taste,” 696, etc. If suchkey words are found 697, the MR-Control may generate s sub tag (e.g.,level 2) with the unstructured data 698 a. If not, the MR-Control maymove on with the next taxonomy rule.

Within implementations, during the taxonomy rule execution process, eachtaxonomy rule may be executed at a leaf node and then the next higherlevel may be computed. Upon finishing with a taxonomy tree, theMR-Control may generate a matching score of the applied taxonomy logics699. For example, the score may be based on a similarity percentage ofthe key terms in each node of the taxonomy tree and the comparedunstructured data segment. To maintain efficiency, taxonomy executionmodels may be logically partitioned. For example, for a segment of rawtext, the same unstructured text segment may be executed throughdifferent models and scores generated may be merged and aggregated. Whenthe similarity score is greater than a threshold (e.g., 80%, etc.) 6100,the current tagging generated from 682-698 a may be saved 6102.Otherwise, the MR-Control may proceed with a different taxonomy model,e.g., at 686 in FIG. 6E.

In one implementations, MR-Control may apply one or more taxonomy logicsto an unstructured data segment, as the data segment (e.g., a Tweet, aFacebook post, etc.) may be related to one or more brand products, etc.

In further implementations, the taxonomy tagging mechanism may beassociated with a weighting score at each “node” of the taxonomyhierarchy. For example, in the above example for “Coke,” if theMR-Control receives a client request to analyze consumer impressionabout a new product of Coca Cola on social media analytics, theMR-Control may perform taxonomy mining upon unstructured data from thesocial media (e.g., consumer comments). Each “node” may be progressivelyassociated with a weight score to determine consumer impression. Forexample, when the data comprises “Coke,” a level o weight score may beassigned (e.g., 0.1, etc.); when the data comprises “Coke+good” or“Coke+excellent,” a level 1 weight score may be assigned (e.g., 0.5,etc.); but when the data comprises “Coke+horrible” or “Coke” with othernegatively indicative adjectives, a negative level 1 weight score may beassigned (e.g., −0.5, etc.). In one implementation, the taxonomy enginemay calculate an overall score of an unstructured data record whenprogressively querying upon taxonomy key terms, and generate statisticalresults of a group of unstructured data to determine the consumerimpression. For example, the MR-Control may generate statistical reportas to how many consumers are positive, neutral, or negative towards“Coke,” based on their calculated scores, as illustrated in one examplein FIGS. 6E-6F. For another example, the MR-Control may generate popularbrands, TV shows that are the mostly mentioned or positively commentedfrom social media users, e.g., see FIG. 10H. In further implementations,the MR-Control may determine a social group to analyze their socialcontent. For example, within the social group, the MR-Control maydetermine user's influence over

over other members of the population, e.g., whether a user is an“influencer.” For example, when a user posts comments to the CBS show“The Big Bang Theory” on Facebook, and his Facebook friends have “liked”his comments and subsequently watch the show, the user may be consideredas a Facebook “influencer.” In one implementation, the notion ofinfluencer may be specific to a social media platform; a person who isan influencer on one platform may not be an influencer on another.

In one implementation, the social influencer may be determined by socialmedia indices. For example, the MR-Control may analyze prerequisites forconsideration as a social media influencer, such as whether a user hasan account on a social web platform, whether the user has generatedcontent on that platform within the past 30 days, and/or the like.

In one implementation, the MR-Control may calculate social media indexof a user to determine an influencer. For each member that meets theprerequisites, a social media index is calculated using variousmeasures. For example, the MR-Control may calculate a reach measure,e.g., over the past 30 days, the maximum size of the network, which maybe measured through “friends”, “followers”, or other similar measures.For another example, the MR-Control may calculate a frequency measure,e.g., over the past 30 days, the total number of posts to the platform,which may be measured through things like “status updates”, “tweets”, or“comments”, depending on the relevant content generation opportunitiesfor the particular platform. For another example, the MR-Control maycalculate a resonance measure, e.g., over the past 30 days, the totalnumber of responses to the individual's content. Depending on theplatform, these responses may take the form of “retweets”, comments on“posts” or “status updates”, or direct messages responses to theindividual. The responses may or may not need to come from individualswithin the population being measured.

In one implementation, the calculated measures are then ranked againstthe same measure from other individuals in his or her demographic group.The demographic measures may include, but are not limited to, age,gender, race, education, and income. The specific groupings used forage, education, and income can vary based on the population beinganalyzed. An individual is considered an influencer if he or she ranksin the top 20% of at least two of the variables.

In further implementation, the influencer determination may be refinedby product category. Each post made by an individual may be classifiedas mentioning a product, or not mentioning a product, based on textanalysis against a standard taxonomy of products and brands. The volumeof posts in each category can be tabulated, and an individual classifiedas an influencer in any product category which represents at least 20%of his or her product-classified posts. In further implementation, asocial influencer may be specified and/or classified with regard to a TVshow category, a category of products, a category of brands, and/or thelike.

FIG. 7A-7E provide exemplary data diagrams and logic flow diagramsillustrating cross-channel data collection and media measurement withinimplementations of the MR-Control. FIG. 7A provides a block diagramillustrating MR-Control data collection within embodiments of theMR-Control. Within embodiments, the MR-Control may adopt a variety oftechnologies including flash cookies, mobile applications, browserplug-ins, and/or the like, to capture media usage across differentchannels, e.g., TV, mobile, internet, social media, and/or the like. Inone implementation, the MR-Control may analyze the media usage data tostudy the advertisement effects of a brand product.

In one implementation, MR-Control may track audience activities tocontent (planning and competitive analysis) and advertising (postanalysis, ad effectiveness). In one implementation, the MR-Control maycreate digital footprints on usage as a bi-product of delivering contentand advertising, e.g., via application session ID, cookie, etc., tocreate dataset that is used for tactical content and advertisingdecisions. For example, the MR-PLATFORM may set up a group of users(e.g., 100,000 users, etc.) to track their TV viewing, Mobile usage,Online surfing history, advertising exposure, demographic information,product ownership info for auto, location, financial services, productusage information for CPG/Pharma, and/or the like to provide surveyresearch for ad effectiveness. In one implementation, MR-Control mayrecruit users with incentive rewards (e.g., the participants may berequired to allow MR-Control to access their social media content asillustrated in FIGS. 5A-5B), e.g., Credit in iTunes or Google App Storeaccount (e.g., $10/quarter=$40 a year), local coupons/offers based onzip code, etc.

As shown in FIG. 7A, the MR-Control may automatically collect data 705from various source, e.g., online advertising usage 715, mobile deviceusage 720, TV viewing data 725, social media data (e.g., Facebookposts/conversations, etc.) 730 via API calls (e.g., see FIGS. 5A-5B). Inanother implementation, the MR-Control may employ panelists 710 toconfigure data downloads parameters, system maintenance, and/or thelike. For example, the panelist may comprise social media users thatallow MR-Control to access their social profile and content foranalytics.

FIGS. 7B-7C provide example flow diagrams illustrating MR-Controlcross-channel data collection in alternative embodiments of theMR-Control. In one embodiment, a variety of data may be obtained andstored in a MR-Control database (e.g., see 219 at FIG. 2A). In oneimplementation, as shown in FIG. 7B, MR-Control may obtain data fromdifferent channel for cross-channel media measurement. For example, theMR-Control may obtain TV channel changing (e.g., user submission ofchannel selection) 790 from a MR-Control TV client application 795 a(e.g., see FIGS. 7A-7G), mobile advertising 791 a and mobile application79 ab usage from a MR-Control application 795 b, social media profile778 a and social media comments 778 b from social media (e.g., FacebookTwitter, 750), user exposure to tagged advertisement 789 a from a clientflash/HTTP cookies 789 b (e.g., see 375 in FIG. 3D), advertisingexposure 790 a (e.g., whether a user clicks on an ad) and website visits790 b from URL tracking of a user browser 797, and/or the like. In oneimplementation, the MR-Control may incorporate the variety of data for across-channel study of user feedbacks of an advertisement, a brand, aproduct, a TV show, and/or the like.

In a further implementation, the MR-Control may utilize the MR-Controlclient component installed at a user mobile device to capture TV viewingin the home, survey responses, and/or the like. In a furtherimplementation, the MR-Control may adopt a mobile meter to measuremobile usage. In another implementation, the MR-Control may provide aclient component which may provide history information from a user'spersonal computer when user connects his mobile device to his computerto sync up so that the MR-Control may track online Internet usage of theuser, e.g., browsing history, clicks on ads, etc. In a furtherimplementation, the MR-Control may track TV ad exposure from a varietyof meter data, e.g., TNS, M+, AceMetrix, and/or the like. In furtherimplementations, data may be collected passively via mobile phones inalmost real time, and/or when phone is being charged.

Within implementations, TV distribution may be driven by an over the airbroadcast and a “one-to many” cable infrastructure. Unlike other mediaand industries, like the Internet and the CPG/retail environment, the TVinfrastructure may not create footprints on usage with content (orproduct) distribution. In such cases, the industry may have a panelbased research to understand the size and composition of TV audiences.All decisions related to programming, ad sales, and carriage dealsbetween multiple system operator and cable networks may be based uponpanel data, which may enable research providers to realize outsizedrewards for providing insights.

In one embodiment, the MR-Control may obtain TV viewing data via ReturnPath Data (RPD) from Digital Set Top Boxes (RDTB), which may facilitateanalysis of TV viewing to provide insights on viewing to small networksand small geographies, e.g., local market measurement reflecting a localTV station or cable MSO zone. For another example, metered data from RPDmay be applied to analyze a group of categorized audience (e.g., heavyCoke drinkers) with targeted ad content (e.g., a 30 second commercial ona niche, targeted network).

In further implementations, the MR-Control may study ad effects bycollecting data with regard to user purchasing activities of theadvertised products. For example, the MR-Control may track user clickson a “Buy it Now” button, e.g., see 750 c in FIG. 7G. In anotherimplementation, the MR-Control may obtain data form retailers,manufactures, Internet players, and/or the like, wherein real storedata, frequent shopper cards usage, and log files (Internet shopping)may be analyzed to study placement decisions, increase traffic and sales(ad visits), use the granular traffic (click-stream) data to designcustomized products/content/advertising to shoppers/viewers, and realtime analytics to better manage ad campaigns, and/or the like. In oneimplementation, a weighing scoring mechanism similar to that illustratedin FIG. 2I may be employed, but expanded to a variety of cross channeltracking data, to analyze ad effects within a cross channel dataset.

In further implementations, the MR-PLATFORM may access to non-livemedia, such as, Charter, TiVo, Rentrak, Internet TV (e.g., Google TV,Apple TV, and/or the like, and incorporate viewing data for analysis(e.g., see FIG. 2H).

In further implementation, Internet measurement data (e.g., from ISPdata, etc.) may be collected, e.g., HTTP cookies, click-stream data withdemographic information, and/or the like.

In further implementations, mobile usage may be tracked via specificapplications (e.g., in a similar manner to log file analysis), anonymouslocation based tracking of cell users, and/or the like.

FIG. 7C shows data collection via a proxy server within implementationsof the MR-Control. For example, in one implementation, a MR-Controlclient application 795 b operated on a user device may collect and sendinformation such as social application usage, GPS location, response tosurveys, etc., to a database 719. In further implementations, socialapplication usage and mobile advertising data may be passed to aMR-Control proxy server 788 (e.g., see FIG. 7E), and/or a VPN server,which may forward it to the database 719. In one implementation, TVviewing data may be provided to the database 719 via a TV remoteapplication 795 a (and/or a TV measurement network). In anotherimplementation, social media engagement data (e.g., user posts, commentson the social media) 750 may be sent to the database as well. In furtherimplementations, the MR-Control may obtain mobile search behavior of auser, exposure to social media (e.g., user viewing friends'recommendations on social media, etc.), and/or the like.

FIG. 7D provides a data flow diagram illustrating MR-Control data flowbetween entities within alternative embodiments of the MR-Control.Within embodiments, a MR-Control database 719 may obtain data fromFacebook server 782 a and Twitter server 782 b via API calls (e.g., seeFIGS. 5A-5C). In further implementations, the access may be validatedand/or authorized by MR-Control panelists. In further implementations,other media exposure 782 e (e.g., see FIG. 7B-9C), survey data 782 f(e.g., from synchronized questionnaire, or other questionnaires handledby panelists, etc.), purchasing data 782 c, may be provided to thedatabase. In a further implementation, the cross-channel data may bestored with a cloud storage 782 d.

In one implementation, a client (e.g., a user, a merchant for analyticsreport, etc.) may access the MR-Control analytics server 755 via awebsite 784, which may in turn operate with a text analytics platform783 c to analyze social content, cross-channel data, and/or the like.

FIG. 7E shows a logic flow diagram illustrating monitoring user devicedata transmission across different channels within embodiments of theMR-Control. Within embodiments, the MR-Control may instantiate a proxyserver to monitor data in/out of the user mobile device 740, wherein thedata may be transmitted to/from different channels. In oneimplementation, the proxy server may receive data 742, and extractinformation from the received data 745 to determine a data type andmonitor the user device activities which may indicate advertisementdelivery/usage information. For example, if the data comprises a websiteURL 746, the MR-Control may determine whether the URL comprises anadvertisement component 748. If yes, the MR-Control may determinecharacteristics of the advertisement 749, e.g., classification of theadvertisement (e.g., media genre, media source, content description,etc.). In further implementations, the MR-Control may determine whetherthe advertisement running on the URL is an automatic advertisement, orrequires user's manual trigger (e.g., user clicks for display). TheMR-Control may obtain identifying information, e.g., an Ad ID, 755, togenerate prompt questions, e.g., at 312 in FIG. 3B.

In further implementations, the MR-Control may identify an advertisementcomprised in a URL link via advertisement image recognition. Forexample, the MR-Control may identify graphical contents contained in aURL link based on empirical pattern of web content format. Suchempirical patterns may be classified per URL link type (e.g., a shoppingsite link such as Amazon.com may have an advertisement placed at thecenter frame of the web page; a news link such as New York Times pagemay have an advertisement placed at the side/bottom bar of the web page,and/or the like). For another example, the MR-Control may identifydynamic contents on the web page, such as, but not limited to flashcontents, banners, applets, and/or the like, as displayedadvertisements.

Within implementations, upon obtaining an image capture of anadvertisement, the MR-Control may adopt software packages to identifycontents of the advertisement (e.g., a featured product name, a brandname, etc.) so that it can be associated with a user's ad exposure. Inone implementation, the MR-Control may generate a unique identifierindicative of visual characteristics of the captured ad graphicalcontents (e.g., a matrix representation of sampling of the captured adimage, etc.), and form a query on an ad database based on the uniqueidentifier. In another implementation, the MR-Control may adopt softwarepackages similar to, but not limited to Google image search, and/or thelike. Further details of advertisement image match may be similar tothat described in U.S. Pat. No. 7,565,139, entitled “Image Based SearchEngine for Mobile Phone with Camera,” which is herein expresslyincorporated by reference.

In one implementation, the MR-Control may dissect an advertisementidentification from the advertisement embedded in the web content (e.g.,the URL link) to determine a product name, a brand name, and/or thelike, which the user has been exposed to. In further implementations,the captured graphical advertisement contents may be tagged withmetadata in compliance with formats associated with an advertisement,e.g., exif data tags (which may include unique advertising identifiersin the software tags, in the inter-operability tags, in the extensionname/ID, extension description tags, and/or the like). Other graphicalmetadata formats may also be contemplated such as XMP, GIF, IPTCinformation interchange model metadata format, and/or the like.

In further implementations, the MR-Control may determine whether a userclicked a URL link comprising media program content, e.g., a Youtubelink, etc. The MR-Control may extract an identifier, e.g., a web ID,etc., to determine the name of the media program. In anotherimplementation, the MR-Control may obtain excerpts of the media program,and determine a name of the media program via an embedded digitalsignature. In further implementation, the MR-Control may set time stampon the user's click on the URL link comprising a media program to recordhow long the user has been exposed to the media program. Furtherimplementations of the ad identification are discussed in FIG. 7F.

In further implementations, the MR-Control may track a user's browsinghistory by monitoring a stream of “clicks” the user has submitted on hismobile device. For example, the MR-Control may monitor user's “clicks”to determine a type of the click, e.g., usage of media playing, visitsof a different URL link, posting of social media contents, usage of anapplication, and/or the like. Using an app. The MR-Control may thendetermine advertisement exposure associated with each “click” (e.g., viaad image identification illustrated in FIG. 7F).

In another implementation, the received data may comprise applicationinformation from the user device 751. The proxy server may ascertain anapplication inventory list of the user device 753, and/or applicationgroup sharing information 754. For example, one or more users who areFacebook friends, may form a group to share their interested TV watchlist and viewing status via MR-Control, and such information may becaptured by the proxy server.

In another implementation, the received data may comprise indication ofmedia usage 762, e.g., channel selection, atmospherics data, etc., theMR-Control may determine whether the TV program on the selected channelhas been listened, watched, and/or streamed 766. The MR-Control maydetermine a title of the media program 767, 6 and retrieve ad tagsembedded in the media program from a media table to determine user adexposure information, e.g., as discussed in FIGS. 3B-3C. In furtherimplementations, the received data may comprise survey responses/socialmessages sent 763 to the MR-Control, as further discussed in FIGS.5A-5E.

In one implementation, the MR-Control may generate media analyticsreport 768 based on the obtained media data, including information as touser impressions to a brand name product, TV shows, etc., e.g., as shownin FIGS. 10A-10H.

In one implementation, the MR-Control may provide advertisers solutionsto design advertising campaigns as to which type of media to place anad, developing media plans with the optimal mix across media, determinethe impact of advertising on brand awareness, favorability measures,intent to buy and actual purchase across media (ROI). In anotherimplementation, the MR-Control may provide advertising measurementsolutions using emerging sources of data, e.g., media consumption data(TV, online, mobile, social, etc.), shopper data for key categories,and/or the like.

In one implementation, the MR-Control may provide clients with insightson campaign effectiveness and recommendations on optimal mediaallocation using survey questionnaires (e.g., as further discussed inFIGS. 3A-3D) based on statistical modeling and regression analysis. Infurther implementations, the impact of each media may be separatelyanalyzed to make recommendation on optimal spend and predict sales basedupon survey responses.

In further implementations, the MR-Control may link different type ofdata for cross channel analysis. In one implementation, the MR-Controlmay create a unified dataset that profiles audiences for TV and onlinemedia consumption, wherein each viewing source (e.g., individual TV set,household TV set, etc.) with viewing and ad exposure information for TVand online is associated with a unique identifier. For example,MR-Control may adopt direct linkage by getting TV and online data forthe same household (e.g., via ISP, cable provider, etc.). For anotherexample, the MR-Control may segment TV and online data, and link usingsegments (e.g., segmented by program category, zip code, air time,etc.). For another example, the MR-Control may devise and distributesurvey questions about TV viewing and linking with the respondents'online surfing data. In one embodiment, the MR-Control may obtain mediaconsumption data from a variety of channels, such as, but not limited togeographically dispersed TV viewing data sets (e.g., CANOE), personstracking with EPGs or embedded in TV software or cell phones, meteringdata from STB, individual smartphone (e.g., Apple iPhone, etc.) basedtracking (e.g., social content, persons' watching activities, etc.),and/or the like.

FIG. 7F provides a block diagram illustrating example infrastructure ofadvertisement recognition within implementations of the MR-Control.Within implementations, the MR-Control may measure which advertisementaudience has been exposed to by mining the monitored data in/out of theuser mobile device, user computer, and/or the like (see e.g., 740 atFIG. 7E). For example, URL links and data file may be collected and sent772 by a data collection software 771 running at a client componentinstantiated on a user mobile device. In another implementation, thedata collection may be performed at a proxy or VPN server.

For digital advertising (online and mobile), MR-Control may classify theadvertisements via a hybrid manual/automatic process. For example,MR-Control may adopt a mobile or PC-based system (using a softwaremeter, VPN, and/or Proxy Server, among other technologies) to pass alongto a staging server the URL of the ad, along with the actual file(typically a .gif, .jpg, or .png). For example, upon receiving ad dataincluding URLs and associated digital files (e.g., media program excerptfiles, etc.) via a network connection 773, the MR-Control server 774 maycompare the received advertisement data with ad profiles in a database775. The filename, file size, and other data may be compared against anad database, and if the ad has already been classified, then the new adexposure event is transmitted to a classification engine 776 classifiedbased on classification rules in the database. Classification rules mayinclude brand and product mentions, as well as ad size and otherdescriptors. If a match is not found, then the ad is put in a queue formanual classification by a MR-Control representative. For example, theMR-Control representative may identify the object (e.g., a product, abrand name, etc.) that is advertised within the ad.

In one implementation, the advertisement may be identified via graphicalcontent match, as discussed in FIG. 7E. In an alternativeimplementation, the ad identification may be performed via an automatedsystem, by which ads that do not match any items in the ad database maybe examined automatically by a computer program for clues as to theproper classification. For example, when an ad that mentions Acura inthe ad image, the MR-Control may automatically classify the ad as anAcura advertisement. Within implementations, the MR-Control may performcharacter recognition procedures (e.g., optical character recognition,etc.) to obtain key terms from advertisement images for advertisingexposure identification. Such ad identification may be used foradvertising effectiveness measurement. Numerous OCR engines may beadopted, such as GOCR, Java OCR, OmniPage, SimpleOCR, and/or the like.

FIGS. 8A-8E provide exemplary mobile screen shots illustrating userinterfaces within embodiments of the MR-Control. As shown in FIG. 8A,the MR-Control user interface may comprise a section for social mediastatus, e.g., the Facebook user “John Smith is watching The Big BangTheory on CBS” 820. The user may also view a list of his friends' status805, e.g., what the friends are watching.

In one implementation, the user may view a list of channel program 810schedules, and may elect to tap on the screen to choose one of thelisted channels. In a further implementation, the user may select toallow ambient monitoring 850, so that the MR-Control may “listen-in” andsubmit atmospherics data to the MR-Control server, as discussed at 241in FIG. 2B.

In further implementations, the user may click on the “Prompts” 820button and view a drop down list of survey questions, e.g., as shown inFIG. 8B. The survey question may be generated based on the media contentthe user has been watching, as discussed in FIG. 3B. Upon the usersubmitting a response, as shown in FIG. 8C, the user response may bepopulated as a social media message 830. In one implementation, theuser's friends may view the user's activity and “likes” the user'sresponse 831 a, commented on the response 831 b, and/or follow the linkof the survey and participate in the survey 831 c.

In further implementations, as shown in FIG. 8D, the user may tap on the“Social” 815 button and launch a drop down panel for social media inputs815 a. In one implementation, the MR-Control may generate an automaticmessage template for the user based on the media ad tags, e.g., the userlikes an embedded product placement 8815 b. For another example, theuser may manually type texts to update his social media status 815 c.

In further implementations, as shown in FIG. 8E, if the user elects tosubmit a message on social media indicating he likes the embeddedproduct placement 835, the user's friends may be aware of the product.For example, the user's friends may like the post 835 a, comment on theproduct 835 b. For another example, the MR-Control may feed a linkdirecting to a merchant site comprising the placed product along withthe social media message, and the user's friend may follow the link tolearn more about the placed product via the social media 835 c.

FIGS. 8F-8G provide example mobile screens illustrating synchronized adswithin implementations of the MR-Control. In one implementation,MR-Control may provide a static (e.g., textual) ad 82 ob in a promptsdrop-down menu 820, as shown in FIG. 8F. For example, when the userselected channel “CBS” has “The Big Bang Theory” on air, and the mediacontent arrives at a timestamp wherein a pair of “white framedsunglasses” is tagged in the scene, MR-Control may generate a pop-up ad820 b and provide a link for a user to tap on to check out for moredetails.

FIG. 8G shows an example interactive ad. For example, the MR-Control maygenerate an interactive ad including a screen shot of the TV programcontaining the placed products. The featured products may be tagged(e.g., highlighted by white-line boxes) in the screen image, e.g., apair of “XYZ-designer French style sunglasses” 850 a, and “DDD Red PolkaDots Bikini Halter Top” 850 b. A user may tap on a “Buy it Now” label850 c to check out more details, and/or be directed to a merchant siteto transact a sale.

In a further implementation, the interactive ad may comprise a userrating of the featured product showing beneath the product. In oneimplementation, the user rating may be obtained from historical userrating data, social media rating, and/or the like. In oneimplementation, the user may enter his own rating by tapping on the box850 d.

In a further implementation, the user may browse the interactive ads(e.g., including screen shots from the TV program comprising productplacement tags, etc.) by going to a previous page 851, and/or a nextpage 852. In further implementations, the user may elect to browseinteractive ads associated with the TV program in a variety ways. Forexample, the user may elect to view a list of all ads 855 a; may electto view by season episode 855 b; may elect to view by character 855 c(e.g., products carried by, or associated with the character names inthe show); may elect to view by item category 855 d (e.g., apparel,accessories, furniture, hair products, etc.), and/or the like. Infurther implementations, the user may initiate a search on desiredproducts 858. For example, if the user is interested in a red hat thecharacter “Penny” wore in one of the scenes, the user may form a queryon the embedded ads table based on key terms “Penny,” “red,” “hat,” etc.

FIGS. 8H-8L provide example mobile screen shots illustrating aMR-Control TV remote client component within embodiments of theMR-Control. In one implementation, as shown in FIG. 8H, a user mayreceive TV guide (e.g., 863) as a list of channel program information860. The user may also receive live TV information updates in a pop-upwindow 861 at a “live” section 862. The user may further configureparameters in a “Remotes” section 864 and “Settings” 865, as furtherillustrated in FIGS. 8J-8L.

When the user tap on the “live” section 862, the user may view a list ofmost viewed programs, e.g., ranked by registered MR-Control users. Theuser may also see a list of program that the user's social friends arewatching 868, and a list of programs the user has selected 866.

FIG. 8I provides example screens illustrating the “Remotes” 864 at FIG.8H within implementations of the MR-Control. For example, upon pluggingan infrared accessory (e.g., see 120 in FIG. 1B) to a user mobiledevice, the user may turn the mobile device (e.g., an Apple iPhone,iPod, iTouch, iPad, BlackBerry, Google Android, Palm, etc.) into aninfrared TV remote control. Upon tapping on “remote” 864, the user mayview a virtual TV remote panel which comprises control buttons for TVprogram information 870 from which the user may tap to select channels,adjust volume levels, etc. The MR-Control may provide a set-top boxcontrol panel to the user for the user to control live/on-demand videoplaying, and/or the like. The user may also configure DVR control 870 a,live TV 870 b, on demand TV 870 c, TiVo 870 d, TV guide 870 d andintelligent TV (e.g., Apple TV 871, Google TV 872), and/or the like. Foranother example, the user may view an array of fast keys for differentchannels 873.

FIGS. 8J-8K provides example screens illustrating the “Setting” 865 atFIG. 8H within implementations of the MR-Control. In one implementation,the user may configure TV provider 875 a, set-top box 875 b, Smart TV875 c, TiVo 875 d, DVD 875 e parameters for the mobile TV remote forMR-Control. In one implementation, the user may enter the zip code 876to receive a list of TV providers available in the area, and select hisown provider. In another implementation, the user may elect to choose“use TV” only, or to set-up and test a set-top box for his televisionset. In further implementations, the user may configure TV and DVDparameters so that the infrared plug-in accessory may query an addressof the TV and DVD set. In one implementation, the user may select a TVbrand 880 from a brand list, and then select a type of the TV. Forexample, the user may tap on a few testing buttons under each type,e.g., “Power,” “Volume,” “Select,” etc., to test whether the remotecontrol works for the TV.

In another implementation, the user may configure DVDs via theMR-Control. The MR-Control may initiate an automatic scan upon userselection, and/or receive an indication from the user of the DVD brand.Upon indicating the DVD brand, the user may test connection with the DVDset to select a DVD type.

In another implementation, the user may enter a zip code to configurethe TV provider 875 a, so that the MR-Control may provide a list of TVproviders for the user to choose.

FIG. 8K provides an exemplary mobile screen shot illustrating socialprofile of a TV program within implementations of the MR-Control. In oneimplementation, the user may select a TV program (e.g., “Channel 5” 885)on a channel to view its social profile. In one implementation, the usermay tap on “Check-in” 886 to populate a Facebook message with regard tothe checked TV program, and/or “Twitter” icon 887 to share suchinformation on Twitter. For example, to “Check-in,” the user may selectpost onto his Facebook wall by typing a message 886 a, and/or share theautomatically generated message 886 a by MR-Control. In anotherimplementation, if the user chooses to “Tweet,” the user may view a listof “discussion” 888 Tweets with regard to the show “The Big BangTheory,” and may generate his own Tweet.

In one implementation, the user may view a social rating 889 of the TVprogram “The Big Bang Theory” under its profile. For example, the rating889 may be given by social users of MR-Control who has viewed theprogram, and the user may elects to submit his own rating 889 a. In afurther implementation, the user may obtain a list of “social watching”890 to see a list of social users (e.g., social media users who hasallowed MR-Control to access their social profiles, etc.) who iswatching the selected TV program.

FIG. 9A provides an exemplary mobile screen shot (e.g., 511 a in FIGS.5A-5B) illustrating user authorization of MR-Control access to theuser's Facebook content within embodiments of the MR-Control. In oneimplementation, a user may receive a message (e.g., a pop-up messagewindow, an email, etc.) requesting a user to elect whether to allowMR-Control to access his Facebook content. For example, the user may tapon a link in the message, e.g., “Yes” or “Not Now” to grant or denypermission to his Facebook content.

In another implementation, as shown in FIG. 9A, a user may configuresocial network connection settings under the settings (e.g., see 865 atFIG. 8H) of MR-Control client mobile application. In one implementation,the MR-Control may send an access request so that a user may view aprompt from his mobile device 911, and may elect allow or disallow theMR-Control access attempt 902. The user may be directed to a Facebooklogin page 910, wherein Facebook may request user to provide logincredentials to verify the permission authorization. For example, theuser may enter his email address 913 and password 915 to login toFacebook. For another example, if the user does not have a Facebookaccount yet, upon tapping on “Yes,” the user may be directed to create anew account. In another implementation, if the user's mobile application(e.g., an iPhone Facebook app, a mobile browser, etc.) stores userpreviously entered login credentials, the user mobile device may sendthe login credentials to the social media to proceed with accessauthorization, so that the user may not need to view the login page 910to manually provide user credentials.

Upon providing Facebook login credentials and verification of Facebook,the user may receive a request for permission screen 911 to select to“Allow” 908 MR-Control to access the user's Facebook profile. In furtherimplementations, the user may configure access parameters in a similarmanner as illustrated in FIGS. 9B-8C.

FIGS. 9B-8C provide exemplary web-based user interface (e.g., 511 b inFIGS. 5A-5B) illustrating user authorization of MR-Control access to theuser's social media content within embodiments of the MR-Control. Forexample, in one implementation, a user may access a web-based MR-Controlconfiguration page via an Internet browser (e.g., Internet Explorer,Safari, Firefox, etc.) to bridge his social media accounts withMR-Control. In one implementation, the user may select a list of socialmedia platforms 920 to join MR-Control, e.g., the user may click oncheckboxes to choose Facebook 921 a, Twitter 921 b, Google+ 921 c,Tumblr 921 d and/or the like. In further implementations, the user mayspecify other social media platforms not listed by MR-Control by typinga URL address, e.g., “FourSquare,” etc. Upon selecting the social media,the user may click “Send Request” 925 so that MR-Control may send aconnection request to the selected social media platforms, e.g.,Facebook 921 a and Twitter 921 b as shown in the example of FIG. 9B. Inanother implementation, the user may click “Cancel” 926 to abort theaccess control configuration.

In one implementation, upon submitting the request 925, the social mediaplatform may request login confirmation 925. For example, the user maybe redirected to the social media homepage to login. For anotherexample, the user may be presented a pop-up window 928 for the socialanalytics to connect with Facebook, e.g., the user may need to provideemail 926 and password 927 to login to Facebook.

As shown in FIG. 9C, upon providing user Facebook credentials, the usermay configure access scope 927 for Facebook content. For example, theuser may elect to allow MR-Control to access his user profile, e.g., theuser may select among a list of checkboxes for user name, user address,user email, user phone number, work information, education information,date of birth, pages, groups, networks, and/or the like. For anotherexample, the user may configure the MR-Control may access his friendsinformation 929, e.g., the user may allow the MR-Control to obtain anumber o friends 929 a but may not allow the MR-Control to accessdetails of the friends list. For another example, the user may allow theMR-Control to access his wall posts 930, e.g., the user may allow theMR-Control to access his post on his own wall 930 a (including sharinglinks, posted photos, status update, messages, etc.). The user mayconditionally allow MR-Control to access his post on his friend's wallwhen the friend allows access to his wall 930 c. Similarly, the user mayconditionally allow MR-Control to access the user's likes/dislikes whenthe liked or disliked item owner allows MR-Control access 930 d as well.

FIGS. 9D-9F provide exemplary web-based user interface illustratingmedia analytics within embodiments of the MR-Control. For example, asshown in FIG. 9D, a MR-Control user/client (e.g., an advertisingmerchant, a TV media producer, etc.) who may desire to know audiencefeedbacks to an ad, TV program, and/or the like, may access a mediaanalytics reports 940 module. In one implementation, the user may selecttabs for different options to view analytics of a targeted object (e.g.,a TV show, an advertisement, etc.). For example, a use may elect to viewcomments categorized by people 941, TV shows 942, brand names 943,products 944, media sources 944, and/or the like.

In one implementation, as shown in FIG. 9D, if the user selects TV shows942, the user may provide information of the TV show by selecting a TVnetwork, (e.g., “CBS” at 945 a), genre (e.g., “Comedy” at 945 b), showname (e.g., “The Big Bang Theory” at 945 c), from a drop down list. Inanother implementation, the user may manually enter a name of the TVshow 945 d to query on a TV show database at MR-Control.

In one implementation, the user may configure analytics parameters suchas social content source 948 (e.g., check on “Facebook” and “Twitter”),time range 949 (e.g., between a specified time and present). The usermay further select a presentation format, e.g., whether to view rawtextual comments 950, or a visualized summary 955 (e.g., plain format955 a, chart/plots 955 b, or table 955 c). For example, if raw text 950is selected, the user may view a list of Facebook comments 950 a, andTweets 950 b related to the show “The Big Bang Theory.”

In another implementation, as shown in FIG. 9E, if the user elects toview analytics report in a visualized format 955, the summary may bepresented in a plain textual format, e.g., 960 a, showing statisticalresults of the positive, neutral and/or negative comments. For anotherexample, charts/plots 960 b, and a table 960 c summary may be presented.In one implementation, the analytics summary may be broken down todifferent categories, e.g., the comments for each category “CBS,” “TheBig Bang Theory,” “Characters,” “Music” of the show, and/or the like.

FIGS. 10A-10H provides exemplary user interfaces of media analyticsreports within embodiments of the MR-Control. FIG. 10 A provides anexemplary MR-Control media analytics UI flow. Within implementations,upon obtaining measurement data from a variety of data channels (e.g.,social media, URL links, mobile metering, etc.), the MR-Control mayprovide web based media analytics platform for a user to access via aInternet web browser. The recorded data analytics as shown in FIGS.10A-10F may be explored via a variety of data file formats includingXML, ASC, and/or the like, through the database export mechanism. Withinimplementations, these exported files may be imported to analyticaltools, such as SAS, etc., wherein various statistical analysis may beengaged. In one implementation, selections made from the dashboard,e.g., a genre selection, 1041 of FIG. 10H, may be used as the queryfilter prior to the export of the physical information, and as such, anddata imported into the package will be limited to the selector (e.g.,genre, name, etc.). The output from a standard statistical output frompackage SAS may be used in its entirety and/or parsed for the dashboardreport. For example, the MR-Control may download the statistical outputin a text format and present it in a dashboard user interface. Inanother example, the SAS output may be reported in a statistical format(e.g., comma delineated XML file), which may enhance parsing for thedashboard report generation.

For example, the MR-Control may provide a welcome/login screen to a user1005, wherein the user may be a MR-Control client, such as a TVproducer, an advertiser, a merchant, and/or the like, who may beinterested to learn their TV audience statistics, brand/productsimpressions, and/or the like.

Upon user login at 1005, the MR-Control may provide a customizeddashboard page 1008, e.g., as further illustrated in one implementationat FIGS. 10B/10H. The dashboard page may provide an overview of themedia analytics results, such as generated report types 1010, availablestatistics charts/plots, and/or the like. For example, the MR-Controlmay perform analytics to generate advertising reports 1012 (e.g.,advertisement delivery reports 1012 a, etc.), audience reports 1015(e.g., an audience summary report 1015 a, audience reports by genderreach 1015 b, by age reach 1015 c, reports per day of week 1015 d,reports per hour during a day part 1015 e, etc.).

FIG. 10B provides an exemplary screen shot for media analytics dashboard1008. In one implementation, a user may elect to configure mediaanalytics parameters. For example, the user may select an object of themedia analytics, which may be a media platform, a TV channel, anapplication platform, and/or the like. The dashboard board may provide adropdown menu to allow the user to select various applications and mediaplatforms e.g., the user may select view application usage of“Foursquare” 1018. In other implementations, the user may selecttargeted MR-Control social users for the study, e.g., by checking usergender 1020, age groups 1021, user interface types (e.g., MR-Controlapplication, mobile, web, etc.), phone types 1023, day part time range1024, user location 1025, and/or the like. In further implementations,the user configured social user group may be saved as a group forfurther analysis.

In one implementation, the media analytics dashboard page may provide aplot of total MR-Control user sessions 1028 based on the user configuredMR-Control social user group. For example, the personal trending datastatistics 1028 may further comprise plots of number of users, number ofsessions, number of new users, median/mean session length, geographicregions of users, and/or the like. In another implementation, MR-Controlmay provide analysis of MR-Control application usage statistics 1029,such as a total number of sessions, a total number of registered users,a median session length per user, and/or the like. In anotherimplementation, the MR-Control may provide a summary table 1030 showingthe study of user selected reporting application “Foursquare,” includingaudience active reach, total visits, visits per person, total web pageviews, page view per person, duration, time per person, web user gender,age, and/or the like. For example, a report on the number of users maysummarize the number of users an application (e.g., “Foursquare”) hashad over period of tracking to indicate whether the number is growing ordeclining. The report may also analyze user sessions in differentscenarios (e.g., whether by a single user). For example, when a mobilesite has been visited for 50 times, but 30 of those times it was fromthe same user, versus another month the number visits from differentusers was 25, the number of users may not be considered as increased.

For another example, a report on number of sessions may include numberof sessions by all users within the last calendar month, which may betracked on a monthly trending basis to indicate how often anapplication/site was seen by all users. For another example, a report onnumber of new users may show the number of new users for the lastcalendar month using the application or mobile site. For anotherexample, the median/mean session length may indicate the time spent onapplication/site. For another example, the geo graphic region of usersmay show a geographical distribution of users engaging or visiting theapplication/advertisement

FIG. 10C provides an exemplary audience summary report 1015 a. As shownin FIG. 10C, the user may select to view “summary” 1030 a, for a datatable showing: for each reporting application (e.g., Facebook, ESPNSportsCenter, etc.), statistics data for Unique Audience, Percent ActiveReach, Time per person (minutes), TPP/Month, Number of visits, Number ofpages viewed, Visits/person, Male/Female (for unique and non-uniqueusers/visitors), Age groups (for unique and non-unique users/visitors).For example, the unique audience may be calculated as the total realnumber of users of an app/site without double counting users that havereused the site/app more than once in a month, and/or the like. Thepercent active reach of all smartphone users may be calculated as thepercentage of users that checked a particular mobile website orapplication within the last calendar month, e.g., when there are 100smartphone users, 88 checked Facebook within the last calendar month,active users equal 88%. The time per person (minutes) may be calculatedas the amount of time spent during a day on a site/app by avg. activeuser, e.g., if there was 88 active users and they used a site/app for atotal of 20 hours during the day, then the time per person is equal to22.72 minutes (20/88=0.2272). The TPP/month may be calculated as thetime per person per month that is spent on the site. e.g., if there are70 users and in total and they spend 1000 hours on the site/app then thetime per person per month would be 11.11 hours (1000/90). The number ofvisits may be calculated as the total number of times an app/site wasvisited during the last calendar month by all users. The number of pagesviewed may be calculated as the total number pages viewed on an app/siteduring the last calendar month by all users. The visits/person may becalculated as the number of visits to app/site on a per active usersbasis. In one implementation, the above mentioned metrics may beassessed by male/female gender classification (for unique and non-uniqueusers/visitors), age groups (for unique and non-unique users/visitors),e.g., age brackets may be 18-24, 25-34, 35-44, 45-54, 55+, etc.

FIG. 10D provides an exemplary audience report per gender reach 1015 b.As shown in FIG. 10C, the user may select to view “Gender Reach” 1030 b,for a data table showing application report classified by gender,including unique audience active reach (%), total duration (in minutes),time per person, time per person for the month, total web page views,pages per person, total visits, visits per person, and/or the like. Forexample, the audience report by gender may include data for eachapp/site broken up by gender. For example, Facebook may provide male andfemale break of user base, about time men spend on the app, number ofpages, etc.

FIG. 10F provides an exemplary audience report per age reach 1015 c. Asshown in FIG. 10C, the user may select to view “Age Reach” 1030 c, for adata table showing application report classified by age, including totalaudience, unique audience, active reach (%), total duration (inminutes), time per person, time per person over a month period, totalpage views, pages per person, total visits, visits per person, and/orthe like broken up in different age groups.

FIG. 10G provides an exemplary audience report per day 1015 e. As shownin FIG. 10G, the user may select to view “Day Part” 1030 e, for a datatable showing application report classified by hours of a day. Forexample, for this report, for this report, data for each app/site may bebroken up by the hour of the day. For example, as shown in FIG. 10G, theYoutube app usage data may be broken up by the hour of the day.

FIG. 10 H provides an exemplary analytics report within an alternativeimplementation of the MR-Control. In one implementation, the MR-Controlmay collect social data from social media platforms of different socialgroups (e.g., 1066 a, 1066 b), e.g., the social groups determined byuser configured parameters as shown in FIG. 10B, to determine a varietyof measures of social TV watching status, such as, but not limited toprofile measures 1051, liking measures 1052, brand measures 1053, TVshows watching measures 1054, and/or the like. In one implementation,the MR-Control may define a social group based on age ranges, gender,demographic information, geographical location, income level,educational level, and/or the like. In another implementation, the usermay configure parameters for TV shows, brands/products, social groups,and/or the like, e.g., genre 1041, actors 1042, networks 1043, first runtime 1044, airing time 1045, brand 1046, product type 1047, date 1048,geography 1049, influencer s 1050, age 1020, gender 1021, and/or thelike.

For example, in one implementation, for a specified TV show (e.g., “BigBang Theory” at “CBS”), the profile measure 1051 may provide social datametrics with regard to social groups, such as percentage of influencersin a social group (e.g., social users whose watching recommendationshave been followed by other social users, etc.), percentage of users whoengage in watching the show, percentage of users who is distracted fromwatching the show (e.g., via atmospherics analysis as illustrated inFIG. 2E), number of friends who have engaged in the TV watching, numberof posts per week, a number of brand pages the social group hasfollowed, number of photos the social group has posted, and/or the like.In further implementations, the MR-Control may analyze the social mediacontent to provide liking measures 1052, such as the most positivelycommented 10 brand pages, music pages, TV show pages, and/or the like;brand measures 1053, such as the top 10 brands, top 5 products mentionedwithin a social group, and/or the like; the top TV shows watched 1054,and/or the like.

MR-Control Controller

FIG. 11 shows a block diagram illustrating embodiments of a MR-Controlcontroller. In this embodiment, the MR-Control controller 1101 may serveto aggregate, process, store, search, serve, identify, instruct,generate, match, and/or facilitate interactions with a computer throughsocial network and electronic commerce technologies, and/or otherrelated data.

Typically, users, which may be people and/or other systems, may engageinformation technology systems (e.g., computers) to facilitateinformation processing. In turn, computers employ processors to processinformation; such processors 1103 may be referred to as centralprocessing units (CPU). One form of processor is referred to as amicroprocessor. CPUs use communicative circuits to carry and passencoded (e.g., binary) signals acting as instructions to bring aboutvarious operations. These instructions may be operational and/or datainstructions containing and/or referencing other instructions and datain various processor accessible and operable areas of memory 1129 (e.g.,registers, cache memory, random access memory, etc.). Such communicativeinstructions may be stored and/or transmitted in batches (e.g., batchesof instructions) as programs and/or data components to facilitatedesired operations. These stored instruction codes, e.g., programs, mayengage the CPU circuit components and other motherboard and/or systemcomponents to perform desired operations. One type of program is acomputer operating system, which, may be executed by CPU on a computer;the operating system enables and facilitates users to access and operatecomputer information technology and resources. Some resources that maybe employed in information technology systems include: input and outputmechanisms through which data may pass into and out of a computer;memory storage into which data may be saved; and processors by whichinformation may be processed. These information technology systems maybe used to collect data for later retrieval, analysis, and manipulation,which may be facilitated through a database program. These informationtechnology systems provide interfaces that allow users to access andoperate various system components.

In one embodiment, the MR-Control controller 1101 may be connected toand/or communicate with entities such as, but not limited to: one ormore users from user input devices 1111; peripheral devices 1112; anoptional cryptographic processor device 1128; and/or a communicationsnetwork 1113.

Networks are commonly thought to comprise the interconnection andinteroperation of clients, servers, and intermediary nodes in a graphtopology. It should be noted that the term “server” as used throughoutthis application refers generally to a computer, other device, program,or combination thereof that processes and responds to the requests ofremote users across a communications network. Servers serve theirinformation to requesting “clients.” The term “client” as used hereinrefers generally to a computer, program, other device, user and/orcombination thereof that is capable of processing and making requestsand obtaining and processing any responses from servers across acommunications network. A computer, other device, program, orcombination thereof that facilitates, processes information andrequests, and/or furthers the passage of information from a source userto a destination user is commonly referred to as a “node.” Networks aregenerally thought to facilitate the transfer of information from sourcepoints to destinations. A node specifically tasked with furthering thepassage of information from a source to a destination is commonly calleda “router.” There are many forms of networks such as Local Area Networks(LANs), Pico networks, Wide Area Networks (WANs), Wireless Networks(WLANs), etc. For example, the Internet is generally accepted as beingan interconnection of a multitude of networks whereby remote clients andservers may access and interoperate with one another.

The MR-Control controller 1101 may be based on computer systems that maycomprise, but are not limited to, components such as: a computersystemization 1102 connected to memory 1129.

Computer Systemization

A computer systemization 1102 may comprise a clock 1130, centralprocessing unit (“CPU(s)” and/or “processor(s)” (these terms are usedinterchangeable throughout the disclosure unless noted to the contrary))1103, a memory 1129 (e.g., a read only memory (ROM) 1106, a randomaccess memory (RAM) 1105, etc.), and/or an interface bus 1107, and mostfrequently, although not necessarily, are all interconnected and/orcommunicating through a system bus 1104 on one or more (mother)board(s)1102 having conductive and/or otherwise transportive circuit pathwaysthrough which instructions (e.g., binary encoded signals) may travel toeffectuate communications, operations, storage, etc. The computersystemization may be connected to a power source 1186; e.g., optionallythe power source may be internal. Optionally, a cryptographic processor1126 and/or transceivers (e.g., ICs) 1174 may be connected to the systembus. In another embodiment, the cryptographic processor and/ortransceivers may be connected as either internal and/or externalperipheral devices 1112 via the interface bus I/O. In turn, thetransceivers may be connected to antenna(s) 1175, thereby effectuatingwireless transmission and reception of various communication and/orsensor protocols; for example the antenna(s) may connect to: a TexasInstruments WiLink WL1283 transceiver chip (e.g., providing 802.11n,Bluetooth 5.0, FM, global positioning system (GPS) (thereby allowingMR-Control controller to determine its location)); Broadcom BCM4329FKUBGtransceiver chip (e.g., providing 802.11n, Bluetooth 2.1+EDR, FM, etc.);a Broadcom BCM47501UB8 receiver chip (e.g., GPS); an InfineonTechnologies X-Gold 618-PMB9800 (e.g., providing 2G/3G HSDPA/HSUPAcommunications); and/or the like. The system clock typically has acrystal oscillator and generates a base signal through the computersystemization's circuit pathways. The clock is typically coupled to thesystem bus and various clock multipliers that may increase or decreasethe base operating frequency for other components interconnected in thecomputer systemization. The clock and various components in a computersystemization drive signals embodying information throughout the system.Such transmission and reception of instructions embodying informationthroughout a computer systemization may be commonly referred to ascommunications. These communicative instructions may further betransmitted, received, and the cause of return and/or replycommunications beyond the instant computer systemization to:communications networks, input devices, other computer systemizations,peripheral devices, and/or the like. It should be understood that inalternative embodiments, any of the above components may be connecteddirectly to one another, connected to the CPU, and/or organized innumerous variations employed as exemplified by various computer systems.

The CPU comprises at least one high-speed data processor adequate toexecute program components for executing user and/or system-generatedrequests. Often, the processors themselves may incorporate variousspecialized processing units, such as, but not limited to: integratedsystem (bus) controllers, memory management control units, floatingpoint units, and even specialized processing sub-units like graphicsprocessing units, digital signal processing units, and/or the like.Additionally, processors may include internal fast access addressablememory, and be capable of mapping and addressing memory 1129 beyond theprocessor itself; internal memory may include, but is not limited to:fast registers, various levels of cache memory (e.g., level 1, 2, 5,etc.), RAM, etc. The processor may access this memory through the use ofa memory address space that is accessible via instruction address, whichthe processor can construct and decode allowing it to access a circuitpath to a specific memory address space having a memory state. The CPUmay be a microprocessor such as: AMD's Athlon, Duron and/or Opteron;ARM's application, embedded and secure processors; IBM and/or Motorola'sDragonBall and PowerPC; IBM's and Sony's Cell processor; Intel'sCeleron, Core (2) Duo, Itanium, Pentium, Xeon, and/or XScale; and/or thelike processor(s). The CPU interacts with memory through instructionpassing through conductive and/or transportive conduits (e.g., (printed)electronic and/or optic circuits) to execute stored instructions (i.e.,program code) according to conventional data processing techniques. Suchinstruction passing facilitates communication within the MR-Controlcontroller and beyond through various interfaces. Should processingrequirements dictate a greater amount speed and/or capacity, distributedprocessors (e.g., Distributed MR-Control), mainframe, multi-core,parallel, and/or super-computer architectures may similarly be employed.Alternatively, should deployment requirements dictate greaterportability, smaller Personal Digital Assistants (PDAs) may be employed.

Depending on the particular implementation, features of the MR-Controlmay be achieved by implementing a microcontroller such as CAST'sR8051XC2 microcontroller; Intel's MCS 51 (i.e., 8051 microcontroller);and/or the like. Also, to implement certain features of the MR-Control,some feature implementations may rely on embedded components, such as:Application-Specific Integrated Circuit (“ASIC”), Digital SignalProcessing (“DSP”), Field Programmable Gate Array (“FPGA”), and/or thelike embedded technology. For example, any of the MR-Control componentcollection (distributed or otherwise) and/or features may be implementedvia the microprocessor and/or via embedded components; e.g., via ASIC,coprocessor, DSP, FPGA, and/or the like. Alternately, someimplementations of the MR-Control may be implemented with embeddedcomponents that are configured and used to achieve a variety of featuresor signal processing.

Depending on the particular implementation, the embedded components mayinclude software solutions, hardware solutions, and/or some combinationof both hardware/software solutions. For example, MR-Control featuresdiscussed herein may be achieved through implementing FPGAs, which are asemiconductor devices containing programmable logic components called“logic blocks”, and programmable interconnects, such as the highperformance FPGA Virtex series and/or the low cost Spartan seriesmanufactured by Xilinx. Logic blocks and interconnects can be programmedby the customer or designer, after the FPGA is manufactured, toimplement any of the MR-Control features. A hierarchy of programmableinterconnects allow logic blocks to be interconnected as needed by theMR-Control system designer/administrator, somewhat like a one-chipprogrammable breadboard. An FPGA's logic blocks can be programmed toperform the operation of basic logic gates such as AND, and XOR, or morecomplex combinational operators such as decoders or mathematicaloperations. In most FPGAs, the logic blocks also include memoryelements, which may be circuit flip-flops or more complete blocks ofmemory. In some circumstances, the MR-Control may be developed onregular FPGAs and then migrated into a fixed version that more resemblesASIC implementations. Alternate or coordinating implementations maymigrate MR-Control controller features to a final ASIC instead of or inaddition to FPGAs. Depending on the implementation all of theaforementioned embedded components and microprocessors may be consideredthe “CPU” and/or “processor” for the MR-Control.

Power Source

The power source 1186 may be of any standard form for powering smallelectronic circuit board devices such as the following power cells:alkaline, lithium hydride, lithium ion, lithium polymer, nickel cadmium,solar cells, and/or the like. Other types of AC or DC power sources maybe used as well. In the case of solar cells, in one embodiment, the caseprovides an aperture through which the solar cell may capture photonicenergy. The power cell 1186 is connected to at least one of theinterconnected subsequent components of the MR-Control thereby providingan electric current to all subsequent components. In one example, thepower source 1186 is connected to the system bus component 1104. In analternative embodiment, an outside power source 1186 is provided througha connection across the I/O 1108 interface. For example, a USB and/orIEEE 1394 connection carries both data and power across the connectionand is therefore a suitable source of power.

Interface Adapters

Interface bus(ses) 1107 may accept, connect, and/or communicate to anumber of interface adapters, conventionally although not necessarily inthe form of adapter cards, such as but not limited to: input outputinterfaces (I/O) 1108, storage interfaces 1109, network interfaces 1110,and/or the like. Optionally, cryptographic processor interfaces 1127similarly may be connected to the interface bus. The interface busprovides for the communications of interface adapters with one anotheras well as with other components of the computer systemization.Interface adapters are adapted for a compatible interface bus. Interfaceadapters conventionally connect to the interface bus via a slotarchitecture. Conventional slot architectures may be employed, such as,but not limited to: Accelerated Graphics Port (AGP), Card Bus,(Extended) Industry Standard Architecture ((E)ISA), Micro ChannelArchitecture (MCA), NuBus, Peripheral Component Interconnect (Extended)(PCI(X)), PCI Express, Personal Computer Memory Card InternationalAssociation (PCMCIA), and/or the like.

Storage interfaces 1109 may accept, communicate, and/or connect to anumber of storage devices such as, but not limited to: storage devices1114, removable disc devices, and/or the like. Storage interfaces mayemploy connection protocols such as, but not limited to: (Ultra)(Serial) Advanced Technology Attachment (Packet Interface) ((Ultra)(Serial) ATA(PI)), (Enhanced) Integrated Drive Electronics ((E)IDE),Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) 1394, fiberchannel, Small Computer Systems Interface (SCSI), Universal Serial Bus(USB), and/or the like.

Network interfaces 1110 may accept, communicate, and/or connect to acommunications network 1113. Through a communications network 1113, theMR-Control controller is accessible through remote clients 1133 b (e.g.,computers with web browsers) by users 1133 a. Network interfaces mayemploy connection protocols such as, but not limited to: direct connect,Ethernet (thick, thin, twisted pair 10/100/1000 Base T, and/or thelike), Token Ring, wireless connection such as IEEE 802.11a-x, and/orthe like. Should processing requirements dictate a greater amount speedand/or capacity, distributed network controllers (e.g., DistributedMR-Control), architectures may similarly be employed to pool, loadbalance, and/or otherwise increase the communicative bandwidth requiredby the MR-Control controller. A communications network may be any oneand/or the combination of the following: a direct interconnection; theInternet; a Local Area Network (LAN); a Metropolitan Area Network (MAN);an Operating Missions as Nodes on the Internet (OMNI); a secured customconnection; a Wide Area Network (WAN); a wireless network (e.g.,employing protocols such as, but not limited to a Wireless ApplicationProtocol (WAP), I-mode, and/or the like); and/or the like. A networkinterface may be regarded as a specialized form of an input outputinterface. Further, multiple network interfaces 1110 may be used toengage with various communications network types 1113. For example,multiple network interfaces may be employed to allow for thecommunication over broadcast, multicast, and/or unicast networks.

Input Output interfaces (I/O) 1108 may accept, communicate, and/orconnect to user input devices 1111, peripheral devices 1112,cryptographic processor devices 1128, and/or the like. I/O may employconnection protocols such as, but not limited to: audio: analog,digital, monaural, RCA, stereo, and/or the like; data: Apple Desktop Bus(ADB), IEEE 1394a-b, serial, universal serial bus (USB); infrared;joystick; keyboard; midi; optical; PC AT; PS/2; parallel; radio; videointerface: Apple Desktop Connector (ADC), BNC, coaxial, component,composite, digital, Digital Visual Interface (DVI), high-definitionmultimedia interface (HDMI), RCA, RF antennae, S-Video, VGA, and/or thelike; wireless transceivers: 802.11a/b/g/n/x; Bluetooth; cellular (e.g.,code division multiple access (CDMA), high speed packet access(HSPA(+)), high-speed downlink packet access (HSDPA), global system formobile communications (GSM), long term evolution (LTE), WiMax, etc.);and/or the like. One typical output device may include a video display,which typically comprises a Cathode Ray Tube (CRT) or Liquid CrystalDisplay (LCD) based monitor with an interface (e.g., DVI circuitry andcable) that accepts signals from a video interface, may be used. Thevideo interface composites information generated by a computersystemization and generates video signals based on the compositedinformation in a video memory frame. Another output device is a TV set,which accepts signals from a video interface. Typically, the videointerface provides the composited video information through a videoconnection interface that accepts a video display interface (e.g., anRCA composite video connector accepting an RCA composite video cable; aDVI connector accepting a DVI display cable, etc.).

User input devices 1111 often are a type of peripheral device 512 (seebelow) and may include: card readers, dongles, finger print readers,gloves, graphics tablets, joysticks, keyboards, microphones, mouse(mice), remote controls, retina readers, touch screens (e.g.,capacitive, resistive, etc.), trackballs, trackpads, sensors (e.g.,accelerometers, ambient light, GPS, gyroscopes, proximity, etc.),styluses, and/or the like.

Peripheral devices 1112 may be connected and/or communicate to I/Oand/or other facilities of the like such as network interfaces, storageinterfaces, directly to the interface bus, system bus, the CPU, and/orthe like. Peripheral devices may be external, internal and/or part ofthe MR-Control controller. Peripheral devices may include: antenna,audio devices (e.g., line-in, line-out, microphone input, speakers,etc.), cameras (e.g., still, video, webcam, etc.), dongles (e.g., forcopy protection, ensuring secure transactions with a digital signature,and/or the like), external processors (for added capabilities; e.g.,crypto devices 528), force-feedback devices (e.g., vibrating motors),network interfaces, printers, scanners, storage devices, transceivers(e.g., cellular, GPS, etc.), video devices (e.g., goggles, monitors,etc.), video sources, visors, and/or the like. Peripheral devices ofteninclude types of input devices (e.g., cameras).

It should be noted that although user input devices and peripheraldevices may be employed, the MR-Control controller may be embodied as anembedded, dedicated, and/or monitor-less (i.e., headless) device,wherein access would be provided over a network interface connection.

Cryptographic units such as, but not limited to, microcontrollers,processors 1126, interfaces 1127, and/or devices 1128 may be attached,and/or communicate with the MR-Control controller. A MC68HC16microcontroller, manufactured by Motorola Inc., may be used for and/orwithin cryptographic units. The MC68HC16 microcontroller utilizes a16-bit multiply-and-accumulate instruction in the 16 MHz configurationand requires less than one second to perform a 512-bit RSA private keyoperation. Cryptographic units support the authentication ofcommunications from interacting agents, as well as allowing foranonymous transactions. Cryptographic units may also be configured aspart of the CPU. Equivalent microcontrollers and/or processors may alsobe used. Other commercially available specialized cryptographicprocessors include: Broadcom's CryptoNetX and other Security Processors;nCipher's nShield; SafeNet's Luna PCI (e.g., 7100) series; SemaphoreCommunications' 40 MHz Roadrunner 184; Sun's Cryptographic Accelerators(e.g., Accelerator 6000 PCIe Board, Accelerator 500 Daughtercard); ViaNano Processor (e.g., L2100, L2200, U2400) line, which is capable ofperforming 500+MB/s of cryptographic instructions; VLSI Technology's 53MHz 6868; and/or the like.

Memory

Generally, any mechanization and/or embodiment allowing a processor toaffect the storage and/or retrieval of information is regarded as memory1129. However, memory is a fungible technology and resource, thus, anynumber of memory embodiments may be employed in lieu of or in concertwith one another. It is to be understood that the MR-Control controllerand/or a computer systemization may employ various forms of memory 1129.For example, a computer systemization may be configured wherein theoperation of on-chip CPU memory (e.g., registers), RAM, ROM, and anyother storage devices are provided by a paper punch tape or paper punchcard mechanism; however, such an embodiment would result in an extremelyslow rate of operation. In a typical configuration, memory 1129 mayinclude ROM 1106, RAM 1105, and a storage device 1114. A storage device1114 may be any conventional computer system storage. Storage devicesmay include a drum; a (fixed and/or removable) magnetic disk drive; amagneto-optical drive; an optical drive (i.e., Blueray, CDROM/RAM/Recordable (R)/ReWritable (RW), DVD R/RW, HD DVD R/RW etc.); anarray of devices (e.g., Redundant Array of Independent Disks (RAID));solid state memory devices (USB memory, solid state drives (SSD), etc.);other processor-readable storage mediums; and/or other devices of thelike. Thus, a computer systemization generally requires and makes use ofmemory.

Component Collection

The memory 1129 may contain a collection of program and/or databasecomponents and/or data such as, but not limited to: operating systemcomponent(s) 1115 (operating system); information server component(s)1116 (information server); user interface component(s) 1117 (userinterface); Web browser component(s) 1118 (Web browser); database(s)1119; mail server component(s) 1121; mail client component(s) 1122;cryptographic server component(s) 1120 (cryptographic server); theMR-Control component(s) 1135; and/or the like (i.e., collectively acomponent collection). These components may be stored and accessed fromthe storage devices and/or from storage devices accessible through aninterface bus. Although non-conventional program components such asthose in the component collection, typically, are stored in a localstorage device 1114, they may also be loaded and/or stored in memorysuch as: peripheral devices, RAM, remote storage facilities through acommunications network, ROM, various forms of memory, and/or the like.

Operating System

The operating system component 1115 is an executable program componentfacilitating the operation of the MR-Control controller. Typically, theoperating system facilitates access of I/O, network interfaces,peripheral devices, storage devices, and/or the like. The operatingsystem may be a highly fault tolerant, scalable, and secure system suchas: Apple Macintosh OS X (Server); AT&T Plan 7; Be OS; Unix andUnix-like system distributions (such as AT&T's UNIX; Berkley SoftwareDistribution (BSD) variations such as FreeBSD, NetBSD, OpenBSD, and/orthe like; Linux distributions such as Red Hat, Ubuntu, and/or the like);and/or the like operating systems. However, more limited and/or lesssecure operating systems also may be employed such as Apple MacintoshOS, IBM OS/2, Microsoft DOS, Microsoft Windows2000/2003/3.1/95/98/CE/Millenium/NT/Vista/XP (Server), Palm OS, and/orthe like. An operating system may communicate to and/or with othercomponents in a component collection, including itself, and/or the like.Most frequently, the operating system communicates with other programcomponents, user interfaces, and/or the like. For example, the operatingsystem may contain, communicate, generate, obtain, and/or provideprogram component, system, user, and/or data communications, requests,and/or responses. The operating system, once executed by the CPU, mayfacilitate the interaction with communications networks, data, I/O,peripheral devices, program components, memory, user input devices,and/or the like. The operating system may provide communicationsprotocols that allow the MR-Control controller to communicate with otherentities through a communications network 1113. Various communicationprotocols may be used by the MR-Control controller as a subcarriertransport mechanism for interaction, such as, but not limited to:multicast, TCP/IP, UDP, unicast, and/or the like.

Information Server

An information server component 1116 is a stored program component thatis executed by a CPU. The information server may be a conventionalInternet information server such as, but not limited to Apache SoftwareFoundation's Apache, Microsoft's Internet Information Server, and/or thelike. The information server may allow for the execution of programcomponents through facilities such as Active Server Page (ASP), ActiveX,(ANSI) (Objective-) C (++), C# and/or .NET, Common Gateway Interface(CGI) scripts, dynamic (D) hypertext markup language (HTML), FLASH,Java, JavaScript, Practical Extraction Report Language (PERL), HypertextPre-Processor (PHP), pipes, Python, wireless application protocol (WAP),WebObjects, and/or the like. The information server may support securecommunications protocols such as, but not limited to, File TransferProtocol (FTP); HyperText Transfer Protocol (HTTP); Secure HypertextTransfer Protocol (HTTPS), Secure Socket Layer (SSL), messagingprotocols (e.g., America Online (AOL) Instant Messenger (AIM),Application Exchange (APEX), ICQ, Internet Relay Chat (IRC), MicrosoftNetwork (MSN) Messenger Service, Presence and Instant Messaging Protocol(PRIM), Internet Engineering Task Force's (IETF's) Session InitiationProtocol (SIP), SIP for Instant Messaging and Presence LeveragingExtensions (SIMPLE), open XML-based Extensible Messaging and PresenceProtocol (XMPP) (i.e., Jabber or Open Mobile Alliance's (OMA's) InstantMessaging and Presence Service (IMPS)), Yahoo! Instant MessengerService, and/or the like. The information server provides results in theform of Web pages to Web browsers, and allows for the manipulatedgeneration of the Web pages through interaction with other programcomponents. After a Domain Name System (DNS) resolution portion of anHTTP request is resolved to a particular information server, theinformation server resolves requests for information at specifiedlocations on the MR-Control controller based on the remainder of theHTTP request. For example, a request such ashttp://123.124.125.126/myInformation.html might have the IP portion ofthe request “123.124.125.126” resolved by a DNS server to an informationserver at that IP address; that information server might in turn furtherparse the http request for the “/myInformation.html” portion of therequest and resolve it to a location in memory containing theinformation “myInformation.html.” Additionally, other informationserving protocols may be employed across various ports, e.g., FTPcommunications across port 21, and/or the like. An information servermay communicate to and/or with other components in a componentcollection, including itself, and/or facilities of the like. Mostfrequently, the information server communicates with the MR-Controldatabase 1119, operating systems, other program components, userinterfaces, Web browsers, and/or the like.

Access to the MR-Control database may be achieved through a number ofdatabase bridge mechanisms such as through scripting languages asenumerated below (e.g., CGI) and through inter-application communicationchannels as enumerated below (e.g., CORBA, WebObjects, etc.). Any datarequests through a Web browser are parsed through the bridge mechanisminto appropriate grammars as required by the MR-Control. In oneembodiment, the information server would provide a Web form accessibleby a Web browser. Entries made into supplied fields in the Web form aretagged as having been entered into the particular fields, and parsed assuch. The entered terms are then passed along with the field tags, whichact to instruct the parser to generate queries directed to appropriatetables and/or fields. In one embodiment, the parser may generate queriesin standard SQL by instantiating a search string with the properjoin/select commands based on the tagged text entries, wherein theresulting command is provided over the bridge mechanism to theMR-Control as a query. Upon generating query results from the query, theresults are passed over the bridge mechanism, and may be parsed forformatting and generation of a new results Web page by the bridgemechanism. Such a new results Web page is then provided to theinformation server, which may supply it to the requesting Web browser.

Also, an information server may contain, communicate, generate, obtain,and/or provide program component, system, user, and/or datacommunications, requests, and/or responses.

User Interface

Computer interfaces in some respects are similar to automobile operationinterfaces. Automobile operation interface elements such as steeringwheels, gearshifts, and speedometers facilitate the access, operation,and display of automobile resources, and status. Computer interactioninterface elements such as check boxes, cursors, menus, scrollers, andwindows (collectively and commonly referred to as widgets) similarlyfacilitate the access, capabilities, operation, and display of data andcomputer hardware and operating system resources, and status. Operationinterfaces are commonly called user interfaces. Graphical userinterfaces (GUIs) such as the Apple Macintosh Operating System's Aqua,IBM's OS/2, Microsoft's Windows2000/2003/3.1/95/98/CE/Millenium/NT/XP/Vista/7 (i.e., Aero), Unix'sX-Windows (e.g., which may include additional Unix graphic interfacelibraries and layers such as K Desktop Environment (KDE), mythTV and GNUNetwork Object Model Environment (GNOME)), web interface libraries(e.g., ActiveX, AJAX, (D)HTML, FLASH, Java, JavaScript, etc. interfacelibraries such as, but not limited to, Dojo, jQuery(UI), MooTools,Prototype, script.aculo.us, SWFObject, Yahoo! User Interface, any ofwhich may be used and) provide a baseline and means of accessing anddisplaying information graphically to users.

A user interface component 1117 is a stored program component that isexecuted by a CPU. The user interface may be a conventional graphic userinterface as provided by, with, and/or atop operating systems and/oroperating environments such as already discussed. The user interface mayallow for the display, execution, interaction, manipulation, and/oroperation of program components and/or system facilities through textualand/or graphical facilities. The user interface provides a facilitythrough which users may affect, interact, and/or operate a computersystem. A user interface may communicate to and/or with other componentsin a component collection, including itself, and/or facilities of thelike. Most frequently, the user interface communicates with operatingsystems, other program components, and/or the like. The user interfacemay contain, communicate, generate, obtain, and/or provide programcomponent, system, user, and/or data communications, requests, and/orresponses.

Web Browser

A Web browser component 1118 is a stored program component that isexecuted by a CPU. The Web browser may be a conventional hypertextviewing application such as Microsoft Internet Explorer or NetscapeNavigator. Secure Web browsing may be supplied with 128 bit (or greater)encryption by way of HTTPS, SSL, and/or the like. Web browsers allowingfor the execution of program components through facilities such asActiveX, AJAX, (D)HTML, FLASH, Java, JavaScript, web browser plug-inAPIs (e.g., FireFox, Safari Plug-in, and/or the like APIs), and/or thelike. Web browsers and like information access tools may be integratedinto PDAs, cellular telephones, and/or other mobile devices. A Webbrowser may communicate to and/or with other components in a componentcollection, including itself, and/or facilities of the like. Mostfrequently, the Web browser communicates with information servers,operating systems, integrated program components (e.g., plug-ins),and/or the like; e.g., it may contain, communicate, generate, obtain,and/or provide program component, system, user, and/or datacommunications, requests, and/or responses. Also, in place of a Webbrowser and information server, a combined application may be developedto perform similar operations of both. The combined application wouldsimilarly affect the obtaining and the provision of information tousers, user agents, and/or the like from the MR-Control enabled nodes.The combined application may be nugatory on systems employing standardWeb browsers.

Mail Server

A mail server component 1121 is a stored program component that isexecuted by a CPU 1103. The mail server may be a conventional Internetmail server such as, but not limited to sendmail, Microsoft Exchange,and/or the like. The mail server may allow for the execution of programcomponents through facilities such as ASP, ActiveX, (ANSI) (Objective-)C (++), C# and/or .NET, CGI scripts, Java, JavaScript, PERL, PHP, pipes,Python, WebObjects, and/or the like. The mail server may supportcommunications protocols such as, but not limited to: Internet messageaccess protocol (IMAP), Messaging Application Programming Interface(MAPI)/Microsoft Exchange, post office protocol (POP3), simple mailtransfer protocol (SMTP), and/or the like. The mail server can route,forward, and process incoming and outgoing mail messages that have beensent, relayed and/or otherwise traversing through and/or to theMR-Control.

Access to the MR-Control mail may be achieved through a number of APIsoffered by the individual Web server components and/or the operatingsystem.

Also, a mail server may contain, communicate, generate, obtain, and/orprovide program component, system, user, and/or data communications,requests, information, and/or responses.

Mail Client

A mail client component 1122 is a stored program component that isexecuted by a CPU 1103. The mail client may be a conventional mailviewing application such as Apple Mail, Microsoft Entourage, MicrosoftOutlook, Microsoft Outlook Express, Mozilla, Thunderbird, and/or thelike. Mail clients may support a number of transfer protocols, such as:IMAP, Microsoft Exchange, POP3, SMTP, and/or the like. A mail client maycommunicate to and/or with other components in a component collection,including itself, and/or facilities of the like. Most frequently, themail client communicates with mail servers, operating systems, othermail clients, and/or the like; e.g., it may contain, communicate,generate, obtain, and/or provide program component, system, user, and/ordata communications, requests, information, and/or responses. Generally,the mail client provides a facility to compose and transmit electronicmail messages.

Cryptographic Server

A cryptographic server component 1120 is a stored program component thatis executed by a CPU 1103, cryptographic processor 1126, cryptographicprocessor interface 1127, cryptographic processor device 1128, and/orthe like. Cryptographic processor interfaces may allow for expedition ofencryption and/or decryption requests by the cryptographic component;however, the cryptographic component, alternatively, may run on aconventional CPU. The cryptographic component allows for the encryptionand/or decryption of provided data. The cryptographic component allowsfor both symmetric and asymmetric (e.g., Pretty Good Protection (PGP))encryption and/or decryption. The cryptographic component may employcryptographic techniques such as, but not limited to: digitalcertificates (e.g., X.509 authentication framework), digital signatures,dual signatures, enveloping, password access protection, public keymanagement, and/or the like. The cryptographic component may facilitatenumerous (encryption and/or decryption) security protocols such as, butnot limited to: checksum, Data Encryption Standard (DES), EllipticalCurve Encryption (ECC), International Data Encryption Algorithm (IDEA),Message Digest 5 (MD5, which is a one way hash operation), passwords,Rivest Cipher (RC5), Rijndael, RSA (which is an Internet encryption andauthentication system that uses an algorithm developed in 1977 by RonRivest, Adi Shamir, and Leonard Adleman), Secure Hash Algorithm (SHA),Secure Socket Layer (SSL), Secure Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTPS),and/or the like. Employing such encryption security protocols, theMR-Control may encrypt all incoming and/or outgoing communications andmay serve as node within a virtual private network (VPN) with a widercommunications network. The cryptographic component facilitates theprocess of “security authorization” whereby access to a resource isinhibited by a security protocol wherein the cryptographic componenteffects authorized access to the secured resource. In addition, thecryptographic component may provide unique identifiers of content, e.g.,employing and MD5 hash to obtain a unique signature for an digital audiofile. A cryptographic component may communicate to and/or with othercomponents in a component collection, including itself, and/orfacilities of the like. The cryptographic component supports encryptionschemes allowing for the secure transmission of information across acommunications network to enable the MR-Control component to engage insecure transactions if so desired. The cryptographic componentfacilitates the secure accessing of resources on the MR-Control andfacilitates the access of secured resources on remote systems; i.e., itmay act as a client and/or server of secured resources. Most frequently,the cryptographic component communicates with information servers,operating systems, other program components, and/or the like. Thecryptographic component may contain, communicate, generate, obtain,and/or provide program component, system, user, and/or datacommunications, requests, and/or responses.

The MR-Control Database

The MR-Control database component 1119 may be embodied in a database andits stored data. The database is a stored program component, which isexecuted by the CPU; the stored program component portion configuringthe CPU to process the stored data. The database may be a conventional,fault tolerant, relational, scalable, secure database such as Oracle orSybase. Relational databases are an extension of a flat file. Relationaldatabases consist of a series of related tables. The tables areinterconnected via a key field. Use of the key field allows thecombination of the tables by indexing against the key field; i.e., thekey fields act as dimensional pivot points for combining informationfrom various tables. Relationships generally identify links maintainedbetween tables by matching primary keys. Primary keys represent fieldsthat uniquely identify the rows of a table in a relational database.More precisely, they uniquely identify rows of a table on the “one” sideof a one-to-many relationship.

Alternatively, the MR-Control database may be implemented using variousstandard data-structures, such as an array, hash, (linked) list, struct,structured text file (e.g., XML), table, and/or the like. Suchdata-structures may be stored in memory and/or in (structured) files. Inanother alternative, an object-oriented database may be used, such asFrontier, ObjectStore, Poet, Zope, and/or the like. Object databases caninclude a number of object collections that are grouped and/or linkedtogether by common attributes; they may be related to other objectcollections by some common attributes. Object-oriented databases performsimilarly to relational databases with the exception that objects arenot just pieces of data but may have other types of capabilitiesencapsulated within a given object. If the MR-Control database isimplemented as a data-structure, the use of the MR-Control database 1119may be integrated into another component such as the MR-Controlcomponent 1135. Also, the database may be implemented as a mix of datastructures, objects, and relational structures. Databases may beconsolidated and/or distributed in countless variations through standarddata processing techniques. Portions of databases, e.g., tables, may beexported and/or imported and thus decentralized and/or integrated.

In one embodiment, the database component 1119 includes several tables1119 a-l. A user accounts table 1119 a includes fields such as, but notlimited to: a UserID, UserName, UserPassword, UserAddress, UserDeviceID,UserViewingHistory, UserRating, UserPreference, and/or the like. TheUser table may support and/or track multiple entity accounts on aMR-Control. A Real Time TV table 1119 b includes fields such as, but notlimited to: TVChannelID, TVChannelName, TVChannelLogo, TVChannelAirTime,TVChannelProgram, TVChannelAd and/or the like. A Media Program table1119 c includes fields such as, MediaID, MediaName, MediaLength,MediaSignature, MediaBrand, MediaTimeTag, MediaAd, MediaAdSponsor,MediaAirTime, MediaChannelID, and/or the like. A Survey Question table1119 d includes fields such as QuestionID, QuestionCategory,QuestionAdID, QuestionDescription, QuestionResponse, QuestionMediaID,QuestionMediaTimeTag, QuestionUserID, and/or the like. An Ad table 1119e includes fields such as, but not limited to: AdID, AdMerchant,AdFormat, AdProduct, AdText, AdTimeTag, AdMediaID, AdChannelID,AdAudioSignature, and/or the like. An Atmospherics table 1119 f includesfields such as, but not limited to: AtmosID, AtmosType, AtmosTimestamp,AtmosUserID, AtmosDeviceID, AtmosPhotoID, AtmosGPS, AtmosMediaID,AtmosChannelID, and/or the like. A User Device table 1119 g includesfields such as, but not limited to: DeviceID, DeviceType,DeviceHardwareID, DeviceMAC, DeviceAppInventory, and/or the like. AReports table 1119 h includes fields such as, but not limited to:ReportID, ReportTimePeriod, ReportMediaID, ReportChannelID, ReportAdID,ReportType, ReportUserRating, Repot. tAdEffect, and/or the like. Asocial content table 1119 i includes fields such as, but not limited to:SocialID, SocialName, SocialUserID, SocialTokenID, SocialUserID,SocialSource, SocialContent, SocialTimeStamp, and/or the like. ATaxonomy table 1119 j includes fields such as, but not limited to:TaxpID, TaxoName, TaxoProducType, TaxoKeyWords, TaxoTreeNode, TaxoLevel,TaxoLabels, and/or the like. A User Token table 1119 k includes fieldssuch as, but not limited to: TokenID, TokenUserID, TokenSocialID,TokenSocialSource, TokenNumber, TokenFile, and/or the like. An AnalyticsWeight Scores table 11191 includes fields such as, but not limited to:ScoreID, ScoreName, ScoreFactorAttribute, ScoreWeight, ScoreDescription,Scorelndication, and/or the like.

In one embodiment, the MR-Control database may interact with otherdatabase systems. For example, employing a distributed database system,queries and data access by search MR-Control component may treat thecombination of the MR-Control database, an integrated data securitylayer database as a single database entity.

In one embodiment, user programs may contain various user interfaceprimitives, which may serve to update the MR-Control. Also, variousaccounts may require custom database tables depending upon theenvironments and the types of clients the MR-Control may need to serve.It should be noted that any unique fields may be designated as a keyfield throughout. In an alternative embodiment, these tables have beendecentralized into their own databases and their respective databasecontrollers (i.e., individual database controllers for each of the abovetables). Employing standard data processing techniques, one may furtherdistribute the databases over several computer systemizations and/orstorage devices. Similarly, configurations of the decentralized databasecontrollers may be varied by consolidating and/or distributing thevarious database components 1119 a-l. The MR-Control may be configuredto keep track of various settings, inputs, and parameters via databasecontrollers.

The MR-Control database may communicate to and/or with other componentsin a component collection, including itself, and/or facilities of thelike. Most frequently, the MR-Control database communicates with theMR-Control component, other program components, and/or the like. Thedatabase may contain, retain, and provide information regarding othernodes and data.

The MR-Controls

The MR-Control component 1135 is a stored program component that isexecuted by a CPU. In one embodiment, the MR-Control componentincorporates any and/or all combinations of the aspects of theMR-Control that was discussed in the previous figures. As such, theMR-Control affects accessing, obtaining and the provision ofinformation, services, transactions, and/or the like across variouscommunications networks.

The MR-Control transforms TV program schedule listing information anduser channel selection via MR-Control components, such as real time TV1042, ad survey synchronization 1043, atmospherics analysis 1044,audience statistics analysis 1045, social media connection 1046, mediaanalytics 1047 and/or the like into TV audience viewing data and adeffects data.

The MR-Control component facilitates access of information between nodesmay be developed by employing standard development tools and languagessuch as, but not limited to: Apache components, Assembly, ActiveX,binary executables, (ANSI) (Objective-) C (++), C# and/or .NET, databaseadapters, CGI scripts, Java, JavaScript, mapping tools, procedural andobject oriented development tools, PERL, PHP, Python, shell scripts, SQLcommands, web application server extensions, web developmentenvironments and libraries (e.g., Microsoft's ActiveX; Adobe AIR, FLEX &FLASH; AJAX; (D)HTML; Dojo, Java; JavaScript; jQuery(UI); MooTools;Prototype; script.aculo.us; Simple Object Access Protocol (SOAP);SWFObject; Yahoo! User Interface; and/or the like), WebObjects, and/orthe like. In one embodiment, the MR-Control server employs acryptographic server to encrypt and decrypt communications. TheMR-Control component may communicate to and/or with other components ina component collection, including itself, and/or facilities of the like.Most frequently, the MR-Control component communicates with theMR-Control database, operating systems, other program components, and/orthe like. The MR-Control may contain, communicate, generate, obtain,and/or provide program component, system, user, and/or datacommunications, requests, and/or responses.

Distributed MR-Controls

The structure and/or operation of any of the MR-Control node controllercomponents may be combined, consolidated, and/or distributed in anynumber of ways to facilitate development and/or deployment. Similarly,the component collection may be combined in any number of ways tofacilitate deployment and/or development. To accomplish this, one mayintegrate the components into a common code base or in a facility thatcan dynamically load the components on demand in an integrated fashion.

The component collection may be consolidated and/or distributed incountless variations through standard data processing and/or developmenttechniques. Multiple instances of any one of the program components inthe program component collection may be instantiated on a single node,and/or across numerous nodes to improve performance throughload-balancing and/or data-processing techniques. Furthermore, singleinstances may also be distributed across multiple controllers and/orstorage devices; e.g., databases. All program component instances andcontrollers working in concert may do so through standard dataprocessing communication techniques.

The configuration of the MR-Control controller may depend on the contextof system deployment. Factors such as, but not limited to, the budget,capacity, location, and/or use of the underlying hardware resources mayaffect deployment requirements and configuration. Regardless of if theconfiguration results in more consolidated and/or integrated programcomponents, results in a more distributed series of program components,and/or results in some combination between a consolidated anddistributed configuration, data may be communicated, obtained, and/orprovided. Instances of components consolidated into a common code basefrom the program component collection may communicate, obtain, and/orprovide data. This may be accomplished through intra-application dataprocessing communication techniques such as, but not limited to: datareferencing (e.g., pointers), internal messaging, object instancevariable communication, shared memory space, variable passing, and/orthe like.

If component collection components are discrete, separate, and/orexternal to one another, then communicating, obtaining, and/or providingdata with and/or to other component components may be accomplishedthrough inter-application data processing communication techniques suchas, but not limited to: Application Program Interfaces (API) informationpassage; (distributed) Component Object Model ((D)COM), (Distributed)Object Linking and Embedding ((D)OLE), and/or the like), Common ObjectRequest Broker Architecture (CORBA), Jini local and remote applicationprogram interfaces, JavaScript Object Notation (JSON), Remote MethodInvocation (RMI), SOAP, process pipes, shared files, and/or the like.Messages sent between discrete component components forinter-application communication or within memory spaces of a singularcomponent for intra-application communication may be facilitated throughthe creation and parsing of a grammar. A grammar may be developed byusing development tools such as lex, yacc, XML, and/or the like, whichallow for grammar generation and parsing capabilities, which in turn mayform the basis of communication messages within and between components.

For example, a grammar may be arranged to recognize the tokens of anHTTP post command, e.g.:w3c-post http:// . . . Value1

where Value1 is discerned as being a parameter because “http://” is partof the grammar syntax, and what follows is considered part of the postvalue. Similarly, with such a grammar, a variable “Value1” may beinserted into an “http://” post command and then sent. The grammarsyntax itself may be presented as structured data that is interpretedand/or otherwise used to generate the parsing mechanism (e.g., a syntaxdescription text file as processed by lex, yacc, etc.). Also, once theparsing mechanism is generated and/or instantiated, it itself mayprocess and/or parse structured data such as, but not limited to:character (e.g., tab) delineated text, HTML, structured text streams,XML, and/or the like structured data. In another embodiment,inter-application data processing protocols themselves may haveintegrated and/or readily available parsers (e.g., JSON, SOAP, and/orlike parsers) that may be employed to parse (e.g., communications) data.Further, the parsing grammar may be used beyond message parsing, but mayalso be used to parse: databases, data collections, data stores,structured data, and/or the like. Again, the desired configuration maydepend upon the context, environment, and requirements of systemdeployment.

For example, in some implementations, the MR-Control controller may beexecuting a PHP script implementing a Secure Sockets Layer (“SSL”)socket server via the information sherver, which listens to incomingcommunications on a server port to which a client may send data, e.g.,data encoded in JSON format. Upon identifying an incoming communication,the PHP script may read the incoming message from the client device,parse the received JSON-encoded text data to extract information fromthe JSON-encoded text data into PHP script variables, and store the data(e.g., client identifying information, etc.) and/or extractedinformation in a relational database accessible using the StructuredQuery Language (“SQL”). An exemplary listing, written substantially inthe form of PHP/SQL commands, to accept JSON-encoded input data from aclient device via a SSL connection, parse the data to extract variables,and store the data to a database, is provided below:

<?PHP header(′Content-Type: text/plain′); // set ip address and port tolisten to for incoming data $address = ‘192.168.0.100’; $port = 255; //create a server-side SSL socket, listen for/accept incomingcommunication $sock = socket_create(AF_INET, SOCK_STREAM, 0);socket_bind($sock, $address, $port) or die(‘Could not bind to address’);socket_listen($sock); $client = socket_accept($sock); // read input datafrom client device in 1024 byte blocks until end of message do { $input= “”; $input = socket_read($client, 1024); $data .= $input; }while($input != “”); // parse data to extract variables $obj =json_decode($data, true); // store input data in a databasemysql_connect(″201.408.185.132″,$DBserver,$password); // access databaseserver mysql_select(″CLIENT_DB.SQL″); // select database to appendmysql_query(“INSERT INTO UserTable (transmission) VALUES ($data)”); //add data to UserTable table in a CLIENT databasemysql_close(″CLIENT_DB.SQL″); // close connection to database ?>

Also, the following resources may be used to provide example embodimentsregarding SOAP parser implementation:

http://www.xav.com/perl/site/lib/SOAP/Parser.htmlhttp://publib.boulder.ibm.com/infocenter/tivihelp/v2r1/index.jsp?topic=/com.ibm.IBMDI.doc/referenceguide295.htm

and other parser implementations:

http://publib.boulder.ibm.com/infocenter/tivihelp/v2r1/index.jsp?topic=/com.ibm.IBMDI.doc/referenceguide259.htm

all of which are hereby expressly incorporated by reference.

Additional embodiments of the MR-Control may comprise the following:

-   -   1. A TV mobile control processor-implemented method, comprising:        -   obtaining TV program schedule listing data;        -   providing the obtained TV program schedule listing data to a            general purpose user mobile device communicatively coupled            to an infrared communication component;        -   receiving a user media program selection message from the            general purpose user mobile device,            -   wherein the general purpose user mobile device transmits                a TV remote channel selection indication to a TV set via                the infrared communication component,            -   wherein the user media program selection message and the                TV remote channel selection indication comprise the same                user selected channel;        -   determining whether the received user media program            selection message indicates a user watching event;        -   determining a user watching time length associated with the            user selected channel when the received user media program            selection message is determined to indicate the user            watching event; and        -   generating and storing a user watching event log file            including the user selected channel and the determined user            watching time length.    -   2. The method of embodiment 1, further comprising:    -   filtering the received user media program selection message when        the received user media program selection message is determined        not to indicate a user watching event.    -   3. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the general purpose user        mobile device comprises any of a smartphone, a personal data        assistant, a cellular phone, a laptop, and a tablet computer    -   4. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the TV program schedule        listing data is transmitted via any of a cellar network, a 3G        network, and a Wifi network.    -   5. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the general purpose user        mobile device transmits a TV remote channel selection indication        to a TV set-top box via the infrared plug-in component.    -   6. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the TV remote channel        selection message comprises a non-live media program selection        message.    -   7. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the non-live media        program selection message comprises any of a DVD control        message, a DVR control message and an on-demand media control        message.    -   8. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the determining whether        the received user media program selection message indicates a        user watching event comprises:        -   calculating a time lapse between two consecutively received            program selection messages; and        -   determining whether the time lapse is sufficiently long to            indicate a user watching event.    -   9. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the determining a user        watching time length comprises determining whether a time lapse        between two consecutively received program selection messages        exceeds a capping threshold.    -   10. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the determining a user        watching time length comprises applying watching time caps based        on any of TV on/off events, set-top box on/off events and        heuristics.    -   11. The method of embodiment 1, further comprising feeding the        user watching event log file for user viewing data record        associated with the selected media program.    -   12. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the general purpose user        mobile device is configured to automatically scan on a        communication stack for a physical address of a TV set.    -   13. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the general purpose user        mobile device receives user submitted TV parameters to scan for        a TV set.    -   14. The method of embodiment 1, further comprising: obtaining an        atmospherics data artifact from the atmospherics data package.    -   15. The method of embodiment 1, further comprising: extracting        user instant activities information based on analysis of the        atmospherics data artifact.    -   16. The method of embodiment 15, further comprising:    -   generating a user viewing status indication based on the user        instant activities information; and    -   incorporating the user viewing status indication into viewer        measurement data of the user selected channel    -   17. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the received TV program        schedule listing data comprises a plurality of ad tags.    -   18. The method of embodiment 17, further comprising:        -   retrieving an ad tag associated with the user selected media            program from the TV program schedule listing data.    -   19. The method of embodiment 18, further comprising:    -   extracting key terms from the ad tags based by parsing ad        contents;    -   querying a survey question list based on the extracted key        terms;        -   generating and sending a survey question from the query to            the user mobile device; and        -   obtaining a user reaction to the survey question.    -   20. The method of embodiment 17, further comprising:    -   generating a social watching status message; and    -   populating the social watching status message to a social media        platform.    -   21. A TV mobile control system, comprising:    -   a memory;    -   a processor disposed in communication with said memory, and        configured to issue a plurality of processing instructions        stored in the memory, wherein the processor issues instructions        to:        -   obtain TV program schedule listing data;        -   provide the obtained TV program schedule listing data to a            general purpose user mobile device communicatively coupled            to an infrared communication component;        -   receive a user media program selection message from the            general purpose user mobile device,            -   wherein the general purpose user mobile device transmits                a TV remote channel selection indication to a TV set via                the infrared communication component,            -   wherein the user media program selection message and the                TV remote channel selection indication comprise the same                user selected channel;        -   determine whether the received user media program selection            message indicates a user watching event;        -   determine a user watching time length associated with the            user selected channel when the received user media program            selection message is determined to indicate the user            watching event; and        -   generate and storing a user watching event log file            including the user selected channel and the determined user            watching time length.    -   22. The system of embodiment 21, wherein the processor further        issues instructions to:    -   filter the received user media program selection message when        the received user media program selection message is determined        not to indicate a user watching event.    -   23. The system of embodiment 21, wherein the general purpose        user mobile device comprises any of a smartphone, a personal        data assistant, a cellular phone, a laptop, and a tablet        computer    -   24. The system of embodiment 21, wherein the TV program schedule        listing data is transmitted via any of a cellar network, a 3G        network, and a Wifi network.    -   25. The system of embodiment 21, wherein the general purpose        user mobile device transmits a TV remote channel selection        indication to a TV set-top box via the infrared plug-in        component.    -   26. The system of embodiment 21, wherein the TV remote channel        selection message comprises a non-live media program selection        message.    -   27. The system of embodiment 21, wherein the non-live media        program selection message comprises any of a DVD control        message, a DVR control message and an on-demand media control        message.    -   28. The system of embodiment 21, wherein the determining whether        the received user media program selection message indicates a        user watching event comprises:        -   calculating a time lapse between two consecutively received            program selection messages; and        -   determining whether the time lapse is sufficiently long to            indicate a user watching event.    -   29. The system of embodiment 21, wherein the determining a user        watching time length comprises determining whether a time lapse        between two consecutively received program selection messages        exceeds a capping threshold.    -   30. The system of embodiment 21, wherein the determining a user        watching time length comprises applying watching time caps based        on any of TV on/off events, set-top box on/off events and        heuristics.    -   31. The system of embodiment 21, wherein the processor issues        instructions to feed the user watching event log file for user        viewing data record associated with the selected media program.    -   32. The system of embodiment 21, wherein the general purpose        user mobile device is configured to automatically scan on a        communication stack for a physical address of a TV set.    -   33. The system of embodiment 21, wherein the general purpose        user mobile device receives user submitted TV parameters to scan        for a TV set.    -   34. The system of embodiment 21, wherein the processor further        issues instructions to:        -   obtain an atmospherics data artifact from the atmospherics            data package.    -   35. The system of embodiment 21, wherein the processor further        issues instructions to:        -   extract user instant activities information based on            analysis of the atmospherics data artifact.    -   36. The system of embodiment 25, wherein the processor further        issues instructions to:    -   generate a user viewing status indication based on the user        instant activities information; and    -   incorporate the user viewing status indication into viewer        measurement data of the user selected channel    -   37. The system of embodiment 21, wherein the received TV program        schedule listing data comprises a plurality of ad tags.    -   38. The system of embodiment 17, wherein the processor further        issues instructions to:        -   retrieve an ad tag associated with the user selected media            program from the TV program schedule listing data.    -   39. The system of embodiment 38, wherein the processor further        issues instructions to:    -   extract key terms from the ad tags based by parsing ad contents;    -   query a survey question list based on the extracted key terms;        -   generate and sending a survey question from the query to the            user mobile device; and        -   obtain a user reaction to the survey question.    -   40. The system of embodiment 37, wherein the processor further        issues instructions to:    -   generate a social watching status message; and    -   populate the social watching status message to a social media        platform.    -   41. A TV mobile control processor-readable storage medium        storing processor-executable instructions to:        -   obtain TV program schedule listing data;        -   provide the obtained TV program schedule listing data to a            general purpose user mobile device communicatively coupled            to an infrared communication component;        -   receive a user media program selection message from the            general purpose user mobile device,            -   wherein the general purpose user mobile device transmits                a TV remote channel selection indication to a TV set via                the infrared communication component,            -   wherein the user media program selection message and the                TV remote channel selection indication comprise the same                user selected channel;        -   determine whether the received user media program selection            message indicates a user watching event;        -   determine a user watching time length associated with the            user selected channel when the received user media program            selection message is determined to indicate the user            watching event; and        -   generate and storing a user watching event log file            including the user selected channel and the determined user            watching time length.    -   42. The medium of embodiment 41, wherein the processor further        issues instructions to:    -   filter the received user media program selection message when        the received user media program selection message is determined        not to indicate a user watching event.    -   43. The medium of embodiment 41, wherein the general purpose        user mobile device comprises any of a smartphone, a personal        data assistant, a cellular phone, a laptop, and a tablet        computer    -   44. The medium of embodiment 41, wherein the TV program schedule        listing data is transmitted via any of a cellar network, a 3G        network, and a Wifi network.    -   45. The medium of embodiment 41, wherein the general purpose        user mobile device transmits a TV remote channel selection        indication to a TV set-top box via the infrared plug-in        component.    -   46. The medium of embodiment 41, wherein the TV remote channel        selection message comprises a non-live media program selection        message.    -   47. The medium of embodiment 41, wherein the non-live media        program selection message comprises any of a DVD control        message, a DVR control message and an on-demand media control        message.    -   48. The medium of embodiment 41, wherein the determining whether        the received user media program selection message indicates a        user watching event comprises:        -   calculating a time lapse between two consecutively received            program selection messages; and        -   determining whether the time lapse is sufficiently long to            indicate a user watching event.    -   49. The medium of embodiment 41, wherein the determining a user        watching time length comprises determining whether a time lapse        between two consecutively received program selection messages        exceeds a capping threshold.    -   50. The medium of embodiment 41, wherein the determining a user        watching time length comprises applying watching time caps based        on any of TV on/off events, set-top box on/off events and        heuristics.    -   51. The medium of embodiment 41, further storing instructions to        feed the user watching event log file for user viewing data        record associated with the selected media program.    -   52. The medium of embodiment 41, wherein the general purpose        user mobile device is configured to automatically scan on a        communication stack for a physical address of a TV set.    -   53. The medium of embodiment 41, wherein the general purpose        user mobile device receives user submitted TV parameters to scan        for a TV set.    -   54. The medium of embodiment 41, further storing instructions        to:        -   obtain an atmospherics data artifact from the atmospherics            data package.    -   55. The medium of embodiment 41, further storing instructions        to:        -   extract user instant activities information based on            analysis of the atmospherics data artifact.    -   56. The medium of embodiment 55, further storing instructions        to:    -   generate a user viewing status indication based on the user        instant activities information; and    -   incorporate the user viewing status indication into viewer        measurement data of the user selected channel    -   57. The medium of embodiment 41, wherein the received TV program        schedule listing data comprises a plurality of ad tags.    -   58. The medium of embodiment 57, further storing instructions        to: retrieve an ad tag associated with the user selected media        program from the TV program schedule listing data.    -   59. The medium of embodiment 58, further storing instructions        to:    -   extract key terms from the ad tags based by parsing ad contents;    -   query a survey question list based on the extracted key terms;        -   generate and sending a survey question from the query to the            user mobile device; and        -   obtain a user reaction to the survey question.    -   60. The medium of embodiment 57, further storing instructions        to:    -   generate a social watching status message; and    -   populate the social watching status message to a social media        platform.

Further embodiments of monitoring audience behavior of the MR-Controlmay comprise the following:

-   -   1. A TV audience monitoring processor-implemented method,        comprising:        -   providing TV program schedule listing data to a user mobile            device;        -   receiving a user channel selection from the user mobile            device;        -   receiving, from the user mobile device, an atmospherics data            package indicating user instant activity status;        -   obtaining an atmospherics data artifact from the            atmospherics data package;        -   extracting user instant activities information based on            analysis of the atmospherics data artifact;        -   generating a user viewing status indication based on the            user instant activities information; and        -   incorporating the user viewing status indication into viewer            measurement data of the user selected channel.    -   2. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the user mobile device        comprises any of a smartphone, a personal data assistant, a        cellular phone, a laptop, and a tablet computer.    -   3. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the TV program schedule        listing data is transmitted via any of a cellar network, a 3G        network, and a Wifi network.    -   4. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the same user channel        selection is transmitted to a TV set via an infrared        communication channel.    -   5. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the atmospherics data        package is captured and aggregated by the user mobile device to        monitor whether the user is watching the selected channel.    -   6. The method of embodiment 1, further comprising determining a        type of the atmospherics data artifact.    -   7. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the atmospherics data        artifact comprises an audio file.    -   8. The method of embodiment 7, further comprising:        -   determining audio content based on audio analysis.    -   9. The method of embodiment 8, further comprising:        -   when the audio content includes human voice, performing            voice recognition to determine whether a vocal source            matches a character in a TV show scheduled on the user            selected channel;    -   10. The method of embodiment 8, further comprising:        -   when the audio content includes human voice, extracting key            terms from the human voice to determine whether the vocal            content is related to a TV show scheduled on the user            selected channel.    -   11. The method of 8, further comprising:        -   when the audio content includes ambient noise, determining            an audience environment status based on the noise level.    -   12. The method of embodiment 8, further comprising:        -   when the audio content includes media music, determine            whether the media music is related to a TV show scheduled on            the user selected channel.    -   13. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the atmospherics data        artifact comprises an image file.    -   14. The method of embodiment 1, further comprising:    -   determining graphic content based on image analysis.    -   15. The method of embodiment 14, further comprising:    -   when the graphic content comprises audience presence, performing        facial recognition to determine a number of presented audiences.    -   16. The method of embodiment 15, further comprising:    -   when the graphic content comprises a TV screen, determining        whether the TV screen is related to a TV show scheduled on the        user selected channel.    -   17. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the atmospherics data        artifact comprises GPS information.    -   18. The method of embodiment 1, further comprising:    -   determining an address type of the GPS information; and    -   determining whether the user is viewing TV based on the address        type.    -   19. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the atmospherics data        artifact comprises a lighting sensing data file.    -   20. The method of embodiment 19, further comprising: determining        whether audience environment is suitable for viewing based on        the lighting sensing data.    -   21. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the atmospherics data        artifact comprises a device application activity log file.    -   22. The method of embodiment 21, further comprising:    -   determining a device application activity type; and    -   determining whether the user is viewing TV based on the device        application activity type.    -   23. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the generating a user        viewing status indication is performed based on a        threshold-based progressive procedure.    -   24. The method of embodiment 23, wherein the threshold-based        progressive procedure comprises:    -   analyzing a first atmospherics data artifact;    -   determining a first user activity indication based on the        analysis;    -   assigning a first weight score value to the first atmospherics        data artifact;    -   determining whether the first weight score value exceeds a        threshold;    -   if yes, determining the user is not watching the selected        channel; and    -   if not, proceeding to analyzing a second atmospherics data        artifact,        -   determining a second weight score value for the second            atmospherics data artifact,        -   generating an atmospherics score by adding the first weight            score value and the second score value, and        -   determining whether the atmospherics score exceeds the            threshold.    -   25. The method of embodiment 23, further comprising:    -   repeating analysis of atmospherics data artifacts when an        accumulated atmospherics score does not exceed the threshold.    -   26. The method of embodiment 23, further comprising:    -   determining the user is not watching the selected channel and        exit the threshold-based progressive procedure when the        accumulated atmospherics score exceeds the threshold.    -   27. The method of embodiment 23, wherein the threshold-based        progressive procedure analyzes atmospherics data artifacts based        on complexity from low to high.    -   28. The method of embodiment 24, wherein the first atmospherics        data artifact comprises any of: GPS information and device        application activity status.    -   29. The method of embodiment 24, wherein the first and second        weight score values are retrieved from the pre-stored data        table.    -   30. The method of embodiment 24, further comprising:    -   when the threshold-based progressive procedure determines the        user is not watching the selected channel,        -   excluding the user from being a viewer of the user selected            channel.    -   31. A TV audience monitoring system, comprising:        -   means to provide TV program schedule listing data to a user            mobile device;        -   means to receive a user channel selection from the user            mobile device;        -   means to receive, from the user mobile device, an            atmospherics data package indicating user instant activity            status;        -   means to obtain an atmospherics data artifact from the            atmospherics data package;        -   means to extract user instant activities information based            on analysis of the atmospherics data artifact;        -   means to generate a user viewing status indication based on            the user instant activities information; and        -   means to incorporate the user viewing status indication into            viewer measurement data of the user selected channel.    -   32. The system of embodiment 31, wherein the user mobile device        comprises any of a smartphone, a personal data assistant, a        cellular phone, a laptop, and a tablet computer.    -   33. The system of embodiment 31, wherein the TV program schedule        listing data is transmitted via any of a cellar network, a 3G        network, and a Wifi network.    -   34. The system of embodiment 31, wherein the same user channel        selection is transmitted to a TV set via an infrared        communication channel.    -   35. The system of embodiment 31, wherein the atmospherics data        package is captured and aggregated by the user mobile device to        monitor whether the user is watching the selected channel.    -   36. The system of embodiment 31, further comprising determining        a type of the atmospherics data artifact.    -   37. The system of embodiment 31, wherein the atmospherics data        artifact comprises an audio file.    -   38. The system of embodiment 37, further comprising:        -   means to determine audio content based on audio analysis.    -   39. The system of embodiment 38, further comprising:        -   means to when the audio content includes human voice,            perform voice recognition to determine whether a vocal            source matches a character in a TV show scheduled on the            user selected channel;    -   40. The system of embodiment 38, further comprising:        -   means to when the audio content includes human voice,            extract key terms from the human voice to determine whether            the vocal content is related to a TV show scheduled on the            user selected channel.    -   41. The system of 38, further comprising:        -   means to when the audio content includes ambient noise,            determine an audience environment status based on the noise            level.    -   42. The system of embodiment 38, further comprising:        -   means to when the audio content includes media music,            determine whether the media music is related to a TV show            scheduled on the user selected channel.    -   43. The system of embodiment 31, wherein the atmospherics data        artifact comprises an image file.    -   44. The system of embodiment 31, further comprising:    -   means to determine graphic content based on image analysis.    -   45. The system of embodiment 34, further comprising:    -   means to when the graphic content comprises audience presence,        perform facial recognition to determine a number of presented        audiences.    -   46. The system of embodiment 45, further comprising:    -   means to when the graphic content comprises a TV screen,        determine whether the TV screen is related to a TV show        scheduled on the user selected channel.    -   47. The system of embodiment 31, wherein the atmospherics data        artifact comprises GPS information.    -   48. The system of embodiment 31, further comprising:    -   means to determine an address type of the GPS information; and    -   means to determine whether the user is viewing TV based on the        address type.    -   49. The system of embodiment 31, wherein the atmospherics data        artifact comprises a lighting sensing data file.    -   50. The system of embodiment 49, further comprising: means to        determine whether audience environment is suitable for viewing        based on the lighting sensing data.    -   51. The system of embodiment 31, wherein the atmospherics data        artifact comprises a device application activity log file.    -   52. The system of embodiment 41, further comprising:    -   means to determine a device application activity type; and    -   means to determine whether the user is viewing TV based on the        device application activity type.    -   53. The system of embodiment 31, wherein the generating a user        viewing status indication is performed based on a        threshold-based progressive procedure.    -   54. The system of embodiment 53, wherein the threshold-based        progressive procedure comprises:    -   means to analyze a first atmospherics data artifact;    -   means to determine a first user activity indication based on the        analysis;    -   means to assign a first weight score value to the first        atmospherics data artifact;    -   means to determine whether the first weight score value exceeds        a threshold;    -   if yes, means to determine the user is not watching the selected        channel; and    -   if not, means to proceed to analyzing a second atmospherics data        artifact,        -   means to determine a second weight score value for the            second atmospherics data artifact,        -   means to generate an atmospherics score by adding the first            weight score value and the second score value, and        -   means to determine whether the atmospherics score exceeds            the threshold.    -   55. The system of embodiment 53, further comprising:    -   means to repeat analysis of atmospherics data artifacts when an        accumulated atmospherics score does not exceed the threshold.    -   56. The system of embodiment 53, further comprising:    -   means to determine the user is not watching the selected channel        and exit the threshold-based progressive procedure when the        accumulated atmospherics score exceeds the threshold.    -   57. The system of embodiment 53, wherein the threshold-based        progressive procedure analyzes atmospherics data artifacts based        on complexity from low to high.    -   58. The system of embodiment 54, wherein the first atmospherics        data artifact comprises any of: GPS information and device        application activity status.    -   59. The system of embodiment 54, wherein the first and second        weight score values are retrieved from the pre-stored data        table.    -   60. The system of embodiment 54, further comprising:    -   when the threshold-based progressive procedure determines the        user is not watching the selected channel,        -   means to exclude the user from being a viewer of the user            selected channel.    -   61. A TV audience monitoring processor-readable non-transitory        medium storing processor-executable instructions, said        instructions issuable by a processor to:        -   provide TV program schedule listing data to a user mobile            device;        -   receive a user channel selection from the user mobile            device;        -   receive, from the user mobile device, an atmospherics data            package indicating user instant activity status;        -   obtain an atmospherics data artifact from the atmospherics            data package;        -   extract user instant activities information based on            analysis of the atmospherics data artifact;        -   generate a user viewing status indication based on the user            instant activities information; and        -   incorporate the user viewing status indication into viewer            measurement data of the user selected channel.    -   62. The medium of embodiment 61, wherein the user mobile device        comprises any of a smartphone, a personal data assistant, a        cellular phone, a laptop, and a tablet computer.    -   63. The medium of embodiment 61, wherein the TV program schedule        listing data is transmitted via any of a cellar network, a 3G        network, and a Wifi network.    -   64. The medium of embodiment 61, wherein the same user channel        selection is transmitted to a TV set via an infrared        communication channel.    -   65. The medium of embodiment 61, wherein the atmospherics data        package is captured and aggregated by the user mobile device to        monitor whether the user is watching the selected channel.    -   66. The medium of embodiment 61, wherein the        processor-executable instructions are further issuable by the        processor to determining a type of the atmospherics data        artifact.    -   67. The medium of embodiment 61, wherein the atmospherics data        artifact comprises an audio file.    -   68. The medium of embodiment 67, wherein the        processor-executable instructions are further issuable by the        processor to:        -   determine audio content based on audio analysis.    -   69. The medium of embodiment 68, wherein the        processor-executable instructions are further issuable by the        processor to:        -   when the audio content includes human voice, perform voice            recognition to determine whether a vocal source matches a            character in a TV show scheduled on the user selected            channel;    -   70. The medium of embodiment 68, wherein the        processor-executable instructions are further issuable by the        processor to:        -   when the audio content includes human voice, extract key            terms from the human voice to determine whether the vocal            content is related to a TV show scheduled on the user            selected channel.    -   71. The medium of 68, wherein the processor-executable        instructions are further issuable by the processor to:        -   when the audio content includes ambient noise, determine an            audience environment status based on the noise level.    -   72. The medium of embodiment 68, wherein the        processor-executable instructions are further issuable by the        processor to:        -   when the audio content includes media music, determine            whether the media music is related to a TV show scheduled on            the user selected channel.    -   73. The medium of embodiment 61, wherein the atmospherics data        artifact comprises an image file.    -   74. The medium of embodiment 61, wherein the        processor-executable instructions are further issuable by the        processor to:    -   determine graphic content based on image analysis.    -   75. The medium of embodiment 64, wherein the        processor-executable instructions are further issuable by the        processor to:    -   when the graphic content comprises audience presence, perform        facial recognition to determine a number of presented audiences.    -   76. The medium of embodiment 75, wherein the        processor-executable instructions are further issuable by the        processor to:    -   when the graphic content comprises a TV screen, determine        whether the TV screen is related to a TV show scheduled on the        user selected channel.    -   77. The medium of embodiment 61, wherein the atmospherics data        artifact comprises GPS information.    -   78. The medium of embodiment 61, wherein the        processor-executable instructions are further issuable by the        processor to:    -   determine an address type of the GPS information; and    -   determine whether the user is viewing TV based on the address        type.    -   79. The medium of embodiment 61, wherein the atmospherics data        artifact comprises a lighting sensing data file.    -   80. The medium of embodiment 79, wherein the        processor-executable instructions are further issuable by the        processor to: determine whether audience environment is suitable        for viewing based on the lighting sensing data.    -   81. The medium of embodiment 61, wherein the atmospherics data        artifact comprises a device application activity log file.    -   82. The medium of embodiment 71, wherein the        processor-executable instructions are further issuable by the        processor to:    -   determine a device application activity type; and    -   determine whether the user is viewing TV based on the device        application activity type.    -   83. The medium of embodiment 61, wherein the generating a user        viewing status indication is performed based on a        threshold-based progressive procedure.    -   84. The medium of embodiment 83, wherein the threshold-based        progressive procedure comprises:    -   analyze a first atmospherics data artifact;    -   determine a first user activity indication based on the        analysis;    -   assign a first weight score value to the first atmospherics data        artifact;    -   determine whether the first weight score value exceeds a        threshold;    -   if yes, determine the user is not watching the selected channel;        and    -   if not, proceed to analyzing a second atmospherics data        artifact,        -   determine a second weight score value for the second            atmospherics data artifact,        -   generate an atmospherics score by adding the first weight            score value and the second score value, and        -   determine whether the atmospherics score exceeds the            threshold.    -   85. The medium of embodiment 83, wherein the        processor-executable instructions are further issuable by the        processor to:    -   repeat analysis of atmospherics data artifacts when an        accumulated atmospherics score does not exceed the threshold.    -   86. The medium of embodiment 83, wherein the        processor-executable instructions are further issuable by the        processor to:    -   determine the user is not watching the selected channel and exit        the threshold-based progressive procedure when the accumulated        atmospherics score exceeds the threshold.    -   87. The medium of embodiment 83, wherein the threshold-based        progressive procedure analyzes atmospherics data artifacts based        on complexity from low to high.    -   88. The medium of embodiment 84, wherein the first atmospherics        data artifact comprises any of: GPS information and device        application activity status.    -   89. The medium of embodiment 84, wherein the first and second        weight score values are retrieved from the pre-stored data        table.    -   90. The medium of embodiment 84, wherein the        processor-executable instructions are further issuable by the        processor to:    -   when the threshold-based progressive procedure determines the        user is not watching the selected channel,        -   exclude the user from being a viewer of the user selected            channel.

Further embodiments of capturing audience atmospherics data at a usermobile device may comprise the following:

-   -   1. A TV audience monitoring processor-implemented method,        comprising:    -   instantiating a TV mobile control component at a general purpose        user mobile device;    -   receiving TV program schedule listing data at the general        purpose user mobile device via a communication channel;    -   obtaining a user selection of TV program via a user interface of        the instantiated TV mobile control component;    -   transmitting a TV remote channel selection indication to a        server via the communication channel;    -   capturing atmospherics data indicative of user activities status        at the user mobile device;    -   generating an atmospherics data package comprising one or more        atmospherics data artifact from the captured atmospherics data;        and    -   transmitting the generated atmospherics data package to the        server.    -   2. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the user mobile device        comprises any of a smartphone, a personal data assistant, a        cellular phone, a laptop, and a tablet computer.    -   3. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the communication network        comprises any of a cellar network, a 3G network, and a Wifi        network.    -   4. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the capturing        atmospherics data is automatically performed by the TV mobile        control component on a periodic basis.    -   5. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the capturing        atmospherics data is triggered by a user.    -   6. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the capturing        atmospherics data comprises snapping a photo by an image        capturing component connected to the user mobile device.    -   7. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the capturing        atmospherics data comprises obtaining a video clip by an image        capturing component connected to the user mobile device.    -   8. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the capturing        atmospherics data comprises recording an audio clip by the user        mobile device.    -   9. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the capturing        atmospherics data comprises obtaining GPS information of the        user mobile device.    -   10. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the capturing        atmospherics data comprises obtaining lighting sensing data by        the user mobile device.    -   11. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the capturing        atmospherics data comprises obtaining device application        activity status on the user mobile device.    -   12. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the atmospherics data        artifact comprises any of an image, a video clip, an audio clip,        GPS information, device application data, and lighting data.    -   13. The method of embodiment 1, further comprising: prompting a        request to a user to position the user mobile device so that an        image capture component is focused on a TV screen.    -   14. The method of embodiment 6, wherein the snapped photo        includes an image of audiences.    -   15. The method of embodiment 6, wherein the snapped photo        includes a TV screen.    -   16. The method of embodiment 8, wherein the audio clip includes        ambient noise of an environment.    -   17. The method of embodiment 8, wherein the audio clip includes        recorded media sound.    -   18. The method of embodiment 8, wherein the audio clip includes        human voices.    -   19. The method of embodiment 7, wherein the GPS information        indicates whether a user is located with a TV set.    -   20. The method of embodiment 10, wherein the lighting data        indicates whether amble light is provided to watch TV.    -   21. A TV audience monitoring apparatus, comprising:    -   a memory;    -   a processor disposed in communication with said memory, and        configured to issue a plurality of processing instructions        stored in the memory, wherein the processor issues instructions        to:    -   instantiate a TV mobile control component at a general purpose        user mobile device;    -   receive TV program schedule listing data at the general purpose        user mobile device via a communication channel;    -   obtain a user selection of TV program via a user interface of        the instantiated TV mobile control component;    -   transmit a TV remote channel selection indication to a server        via the communication channel;    -   capture atmospherics data indicative of user activities status        at the user mobile device;    -   generate an atmospherics data package comprising one or more        atmospherics data artifact from the captured atmospherics data;        and    -   transmit the generated atmospherics data package to the server.    -   22. The apparatus of embodiment 1, wherein the user mobile        device comprises any of a smartphone, a personal data assistant,        a cellular phone, a laptop, and a tablet computer.    -   23. The apparatus of embodiment 21, wherein the communication        network comprises any of a cellar network, a 3G network, and a        Wifi network.    -   24. The apparatus of embodiment 21, wherein the capturing        atmospherics data is automatically performed by the TV mobile        control component on a periodic basis.    -   25. The apparatus of embodiment 21, wherein the capturing        atmospherics data is triggered by a user.    -   26. The apparatus of embodiment 21, wherein the capturing        atmospherics data comprises snapping a photo by an image        capturing component connected to the user mobile device.    -   27. The apparatus of embodiment 21, wherein the capturing        atmospherics data comprises obtaining a video clip by an image        capturing component connected to the user mobile device.    -   28. The apparatus of embodiment 21, wherein the capturing        atmospherics data comprises recording an audio clip by the user        mobile device.    -   29. The apparatus of embodiment 21, wherein the capturing        atmospherics data comprises obtaining GPS information of the        user mobile device.    -   30. The apparatus of embodiment 21, wherein the capturing        atmospherics data comprises obtaining lighting sensing data by        the user mobile device.    -   31. The apparatus of embodiment 21, wherein the capturing        atmospherics data comprises obtaining device application        activity status on the user mobile device.    -   32. The apparatus of embodiment 21, wherein the atmospherics        data artifact comprises any of an image, a video clip, an audio        clip, GPS information, device application data, and lighting        data.    -   33. The apparatus of embodiment 21, wherein the processor        further issues instructions to prompt a request to a user to        position the user mobile device so that an image capture        component is focused on a TV screen.    -   34. The apparatus of embodiment 26, wherein the snapped photo        includes an image of audiences.    -   35. The apparatus of embodiment 26, wherein the snapped photo        includes a TV screen.    -   36. The apparatus of embodiment 28, wherein the audio clip        includes ambient noise of an environment.    -   37. The apparatus of embodiment 28, wherein the audio clip        includes recorded media sound.    -   38. The apparatus of embodiment 28, wherein the audio clip        includes human voices.    -   39. The apparatus of embodiment 29, wherein the GPS information        indicates whether a user is located with a TV set.    -   40. The apparatus of embodiment 30, wherein the lighting data        indicates whether amble light is provided to watch TV.    -   41. A TV audience monitoring processor-readable medium storing        processor-executable instructions to:    -   instantiate a TV mobile control component at a general purpose        user mobile device;    -   receive TV program schedule listing data at the general purpose        user mobile device via a communication channel;    -   obtain a user selection of TV program via a user interface of        the instantiated TV mobile control component;    -   transmit a TV remote channel selection indication to a server        via the communication channel;    -   capture atmospherics data indicative of user activities status        at the user mobile device;    -   generate an atmospherics data package comprising one or more        atmospherics data artifact from the captured atmospherics data;        and    -   transmit the generated atmospherics data package to the server.    -   42. The medium of embodiment 41, wherein the user mobile device        comprises any of a smartphone, a personal data assistant, a        cellular phone, a laptop, and a tablet computer.    -   43. The medium of embodiment 41, wherein the communication        network comprises any of a cellar network, a 3G network, and a        Wifi network.    -   44. The medium of embodiment 41, wherein the capturing        atmospherics data is automatically performed by the TV mobile        control component on a periodic basis.    -   45. The medium of embodiment 41, wherein the capturing        atmospherics data is triggered by a user.    -   46. The medium of embodiment 41, wherein the capturing        atmospherics data comprises snapping a photo by an image        capturing component connected to the user mobile device.    -   47. The medium of embodiment 41, wherein the capturing        atmospherics data comprises obtaining a video clip by an image        capturing component connected to the user mobile device.    -   48. The medium of embodiment 41, wherein the capturing        atmospherics data comprises recording an audio clip by the user        mobile device.    -   49. The medium of embodiment 41, wherein the capturing        atmospherics data comprises obtaining GPS information of the        user mobile device.    -   50. The medium of embodiment 41, wherein the capturing        atmospherics data comprises obtaining lighting sensing data by        the user mobile device.    -   61. The medium of embodiment 41, wherein the capturing        atmospherics data comprises obtaining device application        activity status on the user mobile device.    -   62. The medium of embodiment 41, wherein the atmospherics data        artifact comprises any of an image, a video clip, an audio clip,        GPS information, device application data, and lighting data.    -   63. The medium of embodiment 41, further storing        processor-executable instructions to prompt a request to a user        to position the user mobile device so that an image capture        component is focused on a TV screen.    -   64. The medium of embodiment 56, wherein the snapped photo        includes an image of audiences.    -   65. The medium of embodiment 56, wherein the snapped photo        includes a TV screen.    -   66. The medium of embodiment 58, wherein the audio clip includes        ambient noise of an environment.    -   67. The medium of embodiment 58, wherein the audio clip includes        recorded media sound.    -   68. The medium of embodiment 58, wherein the audio clip includes        human voices.    -   69. The medium of embodiment 59, wherein the GPS information        indicates whether a user is located with a TV set.    -   60. The medium of embodiment 50, wherein the lighting data        indicates whether amble light is provided to watch TV.

Further embodiments of generating media content based surveyquestionnaires may comprise the following:

-   -   1. A media content based survey distribution and collection        processor-implemented method, comprising:    -   providing the obtained TV program schedule listing data        including a plurality of ad tags to a user mobile device,    -   receiving a user media program selection message from the user        mobile device;    -   retrieving an ad tag associated with the user selected media        program from the TV program schedule listing data;    -   extracting key terms from the ad tags based by parsing ad        contents;    -   querying a survey question list based on the extracted key        terms;    -   generating and sending a survey question from the query to the        user mobile device; and    -   obtaining a user reaction to the survey question.    -   2. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the ad tag is related to        an advertisement played during a commercial break associated        with the user selected media program.    -   3. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the ad tag is related to        an embedded ad placed in a scene of the user selected media        program.    -   4. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the ad tag further        comprises a timestamp of an ad, and information related to the        advertised item.    -   5. The method of embodiment 1, further comprising:    -   determining a category of an advertised item based on the        extracted key terms.    -   6. The method of embodiment 5, further comprising:    -   retrieving survey questions from the survey question list based        on the determined category.    -   7. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the generated survey        question is sent to the user mobile device shortly after a        timestamp of the ad tag.    -   8. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the survey question is        synchronized with the ad tag.    -   9. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the survey question        comprises a multiple choice question.    -   10. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the survey question        comprises a URL to a merchant shopping site.    -   11. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the user reaction to the        survey question comprises a submission of answer to the survey        question.    -   12. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the user reaction to the        survey question comprises a click on a URL provided in the        survey question.    -   13. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the survey question is        generated based on ad tags in a user's recent viewing history.    -   14. The method of embodiment 1, further comprising providing        incentive rewards to a user after receiving an answer to the        survey question.    -   15. The method of embodiment 1, further comprising analyzing ad        delivery and effects.    -   16. The method of embodiment 15, further comprising:    -   assigning a weighing score to the user reaction to the survey        question.    -   17. The method of embodiment 16, wherein the weighing score is        determined based on a type of the user reaction.    -   18. The method of embodiment 16, wherein the weighing score is        determined based on a user's answer to the survey question.    -   19. The method of embodiment 15, further comprising: aggregating        weighing scores from a plurality of user reactions to determine        ad effects.    -   20. The method of embodiment 15, further comprising:        periodically update the analysis by combining newly received        user reactions to survey questions.    -   21. A media content based survey distribution and collection        system, comprising:    -   means for providing the obtained TV program schedule listing        data including a plurality of ad tags to a user mobile device,    -   means for receiving a user media program selection message from        the user mobile device;    -   means for retrieving an ad tag associated with the user selected        media program from the TV program schedule listing data;    -   means for extracting key terms from the ad tags based by parsing        ad contents;    -   means for querying a survey question list based on the extracted        key terms;    -   means for generating and sending a survey question from the        query to the user mobile device; and    -   means for obtaining a user reaction to the survey question.    -   22. The system of embodiment 21, wherein the ad tag is related        to an advertisement played during a commercial break associated        with the user selected media program.    -   23. The system of embodiment 21, wherein the ad tag is related        to an embedded ad placed in a scene of the user selected media        program.    -   24. The system of embodiment 21, wherein the ad tag further        comprises a timestamp of an ad, and information related to the        advertised item.    -   25. The system of embodiment 21, further comprising:    -   means for determining a category of an advertised item based on        the extracted key terms.    -   26. The system of embodiment 5, further comprising:    -   means for retrieving survey questions from the survey question        list based on the determined category.    -   27. The system of embodiment 21, wherein the generated survey        question is sent to the user mobile device shortly after a        timestamp of the ad tag.    -   28. The system of embodiment 21, wherein the survey question is        synchronized with the ad tag.    -   29. The system of embodiment 21, wherein the survey question        comprises a multiple choice question.    -   30. The system of embodiment 21, wherein the survey question        comprises a URL to a merchant shopping site.    -   31. The system of embodiment 21, wherein the user reaction to        the survey question comprises a submission of answer to the        survey question.    -   32. The system of embodiment 21, wherein the user reaction to        the survey question comprises a click on a URL provided in the        survey question.    -   33. The system of embodiment 21, wherein the survey question is        generated based on ad tags in a user's recent viewing history.    -   34. The system of embodiment 21, further comprising means for        providing incentive rewards to a user after receiving an answer        to the survey question.    -   35. The system of embodiment 21, further comprising means for        analyzing ad delivery and effects.    -   36. The system of embodiment 35, further comprising:    -   means for assigning a weighing score to the user reaction to the        survey question.    -   37. The system of embodiment 36, wherein the weighing score is        determined based on a type of the user reaction.    -   38. The system of embodiment 36, wherein the weighing score is        determined based on a user's answer to the survey question.    -   39. The system of embodiment 35, further comprising: means for        aggregating weighing scores from a plurality of user reactions        to determine ad effects.    -   40. The system of embodiment 35, further comprising: means for        periodically updating the analysis by combining newly received        user reactions to survey questions.    -   41. A media content based survey distribution and collection        processor-readable non-transitory medium storing        processor-executable instructions to:    -   provide the obtained TV program schedule listing data including        a plurality of ad tags to a user mobile device,    -   receive a user media program selection message from the user        mobile device;    -   retrieve an ad tag associated with the user selected media        program from the TV program schedule listing data;    -   extract key terms from the ad tags based by parsing ad contents;    -   query a survey question list based on the extracted key terms;    -   generate and send a survey question from the query to the user        mobile device; and    -   obtain a user reaction to the survey question.    -   42. The medium of embodiment 21, wherein the ad tag is related        to an advertisement played during a commercial break associated        with the user selected media program.    -   43. The medium of embodiment 21, wherein the ad tag is related        to an embedded ad placed in a scene of the user selected media        program.    -   44. The medium of embodiment 21, wherein the ad tag further        comprises a timestamp of an ad, and information related to the        advertised item.    -   45. The medium of embodiment 21, further comprising:    -   means for determining a category of an advertised item based on        the extracted key terms.    -   46. The medium of embodiment 45, further storing        processor-executable instructions to retrieve survey questions        from the survey question list based on the determined category.    -   47. The medium of embodiment 41, wherein the generated survey        question is sent to the user mobile device shortly after a        timestamp of the ad tag.    -   48. The medium of embodiment 41, wherein the survey question is        synchronized with the ad tag.    -   49. The medium of embodiment 41, wherein the survey question        comprises a multiple choice question.    -   50. The medium of embodiment 41, wherein the survey question        comprises a URL to a merchant shopping site.    -   51. The medium of embodiment 41, wherein the user reaction to        the survey question comprises a submission of answer to the        survey question.    -   52. The medium of embodiment 41, wherein the user reaction to        the survey question comprises a click on a URL provided in the        survey question.    -   53. The medium of embodiment 41, wherein the survey question is        generated based on ad tags in a user's recent viewing history.    -   54. The medium of embodiment 41, further storing        processor-executable instructions to provide incentive rewards        to a user after receiving an answer to the survey question.    -   55. The medium of embodiment 41, further storing        processor-executable instructions to analyze ad delivery and        effects.    -   56. The medium of embodiment 55, further storing        processor-executable instructions to assign a weighing score to        the user reaction to the survey question.    -   57. The medium of embodiment 56, wherein the weighing score is        determined based on a type of the user reaction.    -   58. The medium of embodiment 56, wherein the weighing score is        determined based on a user's answer to the survey question.    -   59. The medium of embodiment 55, further storing        processor-executable instructions to aggregate weighing scores        from a plurality of user reactions to determine ad effects.    -   60. The medium of embodiment 55, further storing        processor-executable instructions to periodically update the        analysis by combining newly received user reactions to survey        questions.

Further embodiments of generating synchronized media content basedproduct placement ads may comprise the following:

-   -   1. A media content based advertising processor-implemented        method, comprising:    -   providing TV program schedule listing data including a plurality        of ad tags to a user mobile device,    -   receiving a user media program selection message from the user        mobile device;    -   retrieving an ad tag associated with the user selected media        program from the TV program schedule listing data;    -   identifying an advertised item embedded in the media program        based on the retrieved ad tag;    -   determining an available ad template associated with the        retrieved ad tag;    -   generating an ad for the embedded advertised item based on the        available ad template; and    -   providing the generated ad to the user mobile device based on a        timestamp of the ad tag.    -   2. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the ad tag is related to        an advertisement played during a commercial break associated        with the user selected media program.    -   3. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the ad tag is related to        an embedded ad placed in a scene of the user selected media        program.    -   4. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the ad tag further        comprises the timestamp of an ad, and information related to the        advertised item.    -   5. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the available ad template        comprises a static ad template.    -   6. The method of embodiment 5, further comprising populating        information of the identified advertised item into the static ad        template.    -   7. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the available ad template        comprises an image captured from the media program, and said        image comprises the identified advertised item.    -   8. The method of embodiment 7, further comprising generating an        interactive ad using the available ad template.    -   9. The method of embodiment 7, wherein the image comprises an        indicia box indicating the identified advertised item.    -   10. The method of embodiment 8, wherein the interactive ad        comprises a rating of the identified advertised item.    -   11. The method of embodiment 8, wherein the interactive ad        comprises an immediate purchasing option including a URL to a        merchant shopping site.    -   12. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the interactive ad        comprises an option for a user to enter a rating for the        identified advertised item.    -   13. The method of embodiment 1, further comprising: providing        options to a user to browse interactive ads.    -   14. The method of embodiment 13, wherein the options comprises:        browsing interactive ads by any of: character, item category,        season, episode.    -   15. The method of embodiment 1, further comprising:    -   receiving a user interaction with the generated ad; and    -   analyzing ad delivery and effects.    -   16. The method of embodiment 15, further comprising:    -   assigning a weighing score to the user interaction.    -   17. The method of embodiment 16, wherein the weighing score is        determined based on a type of the user interaction.    -   18. The method of embodiment 16, wherein the user interaction        comprises any of: entry of product rating, click to view more,        and click to purchase.    -   19. The method of embodiment 15, further comprising: aggregating        weighing scores from a plurality of user reactions to determine        ad effects.    -   20. The method of embodiment 15, further comprising:        periodically update the analysis by combining newly received        user interactions.    -   21. A media content based advertising system, comprising:    -   means for providing TV program schedule listing data including a        plurality of ad tags to a user mobile device,    -   means for receiving a user media program selection message from        the user mobile device;    -   means for retrieving an ad tag associated with the user selected        media program from the TV program schedule listing data;    -   means for identifying an advertised item embedded in the media        program based on the retrieved ad tag;    -   means for determining an available ad template associated with        the retrieved ad tag;    -   means for generating an ad for the embedded advertised item        based on the available ad template; and    -   means for providing the generated ad to the user mobile device        based on a timestamp of the ad tag.    -   22. The system of embodiment 21, wherein the ad tag is related        to an advertisement played during a commercial break associated        with the user selected media program.    -   23. The system of embodiment 21, wherein the ad tag is related        to an embedded ad placed in a scene of the user selected media        program.    -   24. The system of embodiment 21, wherein the ad tag further        comprises the timestamp of an ad, and information related to the        advertised item.    -   25. The system of embodiment 21, wherein the available ad        template comprises a static ad template.    -   26. The system of embodiment 25, further comprising populating        information of the identified advertised item into the static ad        template.    -   27. The system of embodiment 21, wherein the available ad        template comprises an image captured from the media program, and        said image comprises the identified advertised item.    -   28. The system of embodiment 27, further comprising means for        generating an interactive ad using the available ad template.    -   29. The system of embodiment 27, wherein the image comprises an        indicia box indicating the identified advertised item.    -   30. The system of embodiment 28, wherein the interactive ad        comprises a rating of the identified advertised item.    -   31. The system of embodiment 28, wherein the interactive ad        comprises an immediate purchasing option including a URL to a        merchant shopping site.    -   32. The system of embodiment 21, wherein the interactive ad        comprises an option for a user to enter a rating for the        identified advertised item.    -   33. The system of embodiment 21, further comprising: providing        options to a user to browse interactive ads.    -   34. The system of embodiment 33, wherein the options comprises:        browsing interactive ads by any of: character, item category,        season, episode.    -   35. The system of embodiment 21, further comprising:    -   receiving a user interaction with the generated ad; and    -   analyzing ad delivery and effects.    -   36. The system of embodiment 35, further comprising:    -   assigning a weighing score to the user interaction.    -   37. The system of embodiment 36, wherein the weighing score is        determined based on a type of the user interaction.    -   38. The system of embodiment 36, wherein the user interaction        comprises any of: entry of product rating, click to view more,        and click to purchase.    -   39. The system of embodiment 35, further comprising: means for        aggregating weighing scores from a plurality of user reactions        to determine ad effects.    -   40. The system of embodiment 35, further comprising: means for        periodically updating the analysis by combining newly received        user interactions.    -   41. A media content based advertising processor-readable        non-transitory medium storing processor-executable instructions        to:    -   provide TV program schedule listing data including a plurality        of ad tags to a user mobile device,    -   receive a user media program selection message from the user        mobile device;    -   retrieve an ad tag associated with the user selected media        program from the TV program schedule listing data;    -   identify an advertised item embedded in the media program based        on the retrieved ad tag;    -   determine an available ad template associated with the retrieved        ad tag;    -   generate an ad for the embedded advertised item based on the        available ad template; and    -   provide the generated ad to the user mobile device based on a        timestamp of the ad tag.    -   42. The medium of embodiment 41, wherein the ad tag is related        to an advertisement played during a commercial break associated        with the user selected media program.    -   43. The medium of embodiment 41, wherein the ad tag is related        to an embedded ad placed in a scene of the user selected media        program.    -   44. The medium of embodiment 41, wherein the ad tag further        comprises the timestamp of an ad, and information related to the        advertised item.    -   45. The medium of embodiment 41, wherein the available ad        template comprises a static ad template.    -   46. The medium of embodiment 45, further storing instructions to        populate information of the identified advertised item into the        static ad template.    -   47. The medium of embodiment 41, wherein the available ad        template comprises an image captured from the media program, and        said image comprises the identified advertised item.    -   48. The medium of embodiment 47, further storing instructions to        generate an interactive ad using the available ad template.    -   49. The medium of embodiment 47, wherein the image comprises an        indicia box indicating the identified advertised item.    -   50. The medium of embodiment 48, wherein the interactive ad        comprises a rating of the identified advertised item.    -   51. The medium of embodiment 48, wherein the interactive ad        comprises an immediate purchasing option including a URL to a        merchant shopping site.    -   52. The medium of embodiment 41, wherein the interactive ad        comprises an option for a user to enter a rating for the        identified advertised item.    -   53. The medium of embodiment 41, further storing instructions to        provide options to a user to browse interactive ads.    -   54. The medium of embodiment 43, wherein the options comprises:        browsing interactive ads by any of: character, item category,        season, episode.    -   55. The medium of embodiment 41, further storing instructions        to:    -   receive a user interaction with the generated ad; and    -   analyze ad delivery and effects.    -   56. The medium of embodiment 55, further storing instructions        to:    -   assign a weighing score to the user interaction.    -   57. The medium of embodiment 56, wherein the weighing score is        determined based on a type of the user interaction.    -   58. The medium of embodiment 57, wherein the user interaction        comprises any of: entry of product rating, click to view more,        and click to purchase.    -   59. The medium of embodiment 55, further comprising: aggregating        weighing scores from a plurality of user reactions to determine        ad effects.    -   60. The medium of embodiment 55, further comprising:        periodically update the analysis by combining newly received        user interactions.

Further embodiments of social content access may comprise the following:

-   -   1. A social media content access processor-implemented method,        comprising:    -   identifying a request to access user social media content;    -   obtaining user authorization credentials to access user social        media content;    -   sending an access request with the obtained user authorization        credentials to a social media platform;    -   receiving social media content data from the social media        platform;    -   determining a type of the received media content data;    -   tagging the received media content data based on the type        according to a progressive taxonomy mechanism;    -   receive a social media analytics request for an item;    -   querying the tagged media content data based on key terms        related to the item; and    -   determining impression heuristics for the item based on query        results.    -   2. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the request to access        social media content comprises a request received from a user to        populate a social watching event status to a social media        platform.    -   3. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the request to access        social media content comprises a periodic social media content        update.    -   4. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the request to access        social media content is triggered by an obtained request for        social media analytics.    -   5. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the obtaining user        authorization credentials comprises:    -   prompting a user to provide social media login credentials.    -   6. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the obtaining user        authorization credentials comprises: redirecting a user to a        social media login page.    -   7. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the social media platform        obtains a user application ID and user permission.    -   8. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the user authorization        credentials comprise a user token received from the social media        platform.    -   9. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the receiving social        media content data from the social media platform is scheduled        on a periodic basis.    -   10. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the receiving social        media content data from the social media platform is performed        on demand.    -   11. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the type of the received        media content data comprises any of structured data and        unstructured data.    -   12. The method of embodiment ii, wherein the structured data        comprises any of a number of user social media connections and a        user profile.    -   13. The method of embodiment ii, wherein the unstructured data        comprises raw texts of social media comments.    -   14. The method of embodiment ii, wherein the tagging the        received media content data comprises tagging unstructured data        based on category of data content.    -   15. The method of embodiment 1, wherein progressive taxonomy        mechanism comprises a set of pre-determined key terms.    -   16. The method of embodiment 15, further comprising:    -   querying the social media content based on a key term; and    -   tagging the social media content with the key term when the        query finds such key term.    -   17. The method of embodiment 15, further comprising:    -   perform text analytics on the social media content.    -   18. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the social media        analytics request comprises an impression request of the item.    -   19. The method of embodiment 1, further comprising: determining        a key word for the item.    -   20. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the item comprises a TV        show.    -   21. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the item comprises a        brand name product.    -   22. The method of embodiment 19, further comprising: determining        whether tags of unstructured data includes the key word.    -   23. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the determining        impression heuristics comprises assigning a weight value to the        social media content based on the progressive mechanism.    -   24. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the determining        impression heuristics of the item based on query results        comprises calculating an impression score.    -   25. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the impression        heuristics is determined based on statistical analysis of social        media content.    -   26. A social media content access processor-implemented system,        comprising:    -   means for identifying a request to access user social media        content;    -   means for obtaining user authorization credentials to access        user social media content;    -   means for sending an access request with the obtained user        authorization credentials to a social media platform;    -   means for receiving social media content data from the social        media platform;    -   means for determining a type of the received media content data;    -   means for tagging the received media content data based on the        type according to a progressive taxonomy mechanism;    -   means for receiving a social media analytics request for an        item;    -   means for querying the tagged media content data based on key        terms related to the item; and    -   means for determining impression heuristics for the item based        on query results.    -   27. The system of embodiment 26, wherein the request to access        social media content comprises a request received from a user to        populate a social watching event status to a social media        platform.    -   28. The system of embodiment 26, wherein the request to access        social media content comprises a periodic social media content        update.

29. The system of embodiment 26, wherein the request to access socialmedia content is triggered by an obtained request for social mediaanalytics.

-   -   30. The system of embodiment 26, wherein the obtaining user        authorization credentials comprises:    -   prompting a user to provide social media login credentials.    -   31. The system of embodiment 26, wherein the obtaining user        authorization credentials comprises: redirecting a user to a        social media login page.    -   32. The system of embodiment 26, wherein the social media        platform obtains a user application ID and user permission.    -   33. The system of embodiment 26, wherein the user authorization        credentials comprise a user token received from the social media        platform.    -   34. The system of embodiment 26, wherein the receiving social        media content data from the social media platform is scheduled        on a periodic basis.    -   35. The system of embodiment 26, wherein the receiving social        media content data from the social media platform is performed        on demand.    -   36. The system of embodiment 26, wherein the type of the        received media content data comprises any of structured data and        unstructured data.    -   37. The system of embodiment 36, wherein the structured data        comprises any of a number of user social media connections and a        user profile.    -   38. The system of embodiment 36, wherein the unstructured data        comprises raw texts of social media comments.    -   39. The system of embodiment 36, wherein the tagging the        received media content data comprises tagging unstructured data        based on category of data content.    -   40. The system of embodiment 26, wherein progressive taxonomy        mechanism comprises a set of pre-determined key terms.    -   41. The system of embodiment 26, further comprising:    -   means for querying the social media content based on a key term;        and    -   means for tagging the social media content with the key term        when the query finds such key term.    -   42. The system of embodiment 26, further comprising:    -   means for performing text analytics on the social media content.    -   43. The system of embodiment 26, wherein the social media        analytics request comprises an impression request of the item.    -   44. The system of embodiment 26, further comprising: means for        determining a key word for the item.    -   45. The system of embodiment 26, wherein the item comprises a TV        show.    -   46. The system of embodiment 26, wherein the item comprises a        brand name product.    -   47. The system of embodiment 26, further comprising: means for        determining whether tags of unstructured data includes the key        word.    -   48. The system of embodiment 26, wherein the determining        impression heuristics comprises assigning a weight value to the        social media content based on the progressive mechanism.    -   49. The system of embodiment 26, wherein the determining        impression heuristics of the item based on query results        comprises calculating an impression score.    -   50. The system of embodiment 26, wherein the impression        heuristics is determined based on statistical analysis of social        media content.    -   51. A social media content access processor-readable        non-transitory medium storing processor-executable instructions        to:    -   identify a request to access user social media content;    -   obtain user authorization credentials to access user social        media content;    -   send an access request with the obtained user authorization        credentials to a social media platform;    -   receive social media content data from the social media        platform;    -   determine a type of the received media content data;    -   tag the received media content data based on the type according        to a progressive taxonomy mechanism;    -   receive a social media analytics request for an item;    -   query the tagged media content data based on key terms related        to the item; and    -   determine impression heuristics for the item based on query        results.    -   52. The medium of embodiment 51, wherein the request to access        social media content comprises a request received from a user to        populate a social watching event status to a social media        platform.    -   53. The medium of embodiment 51, wherein the request to access        social media content comprises a periodic social media content        update.    -   54. The medium of embodiment 51, wherein the request to access        social media content is triggered by an obtained request for        social media analytics.    -   55. The medium of embodiment 51, wherein the obtaining user        authorization credentials comprises:    -   prompting a user to provide social media login credentials.    -   56. The medium of embodiment 51, wherein the obtaining user        authorization credentials comprises: redirecting a user to a        social media login page.    -   57. The medium of embodiment 51, wherein the social media        platform obtains a user application ID and user permission.    -   58. The medium of embodiment 51, wherein the user authorization        credentials comprise a user token received from the social media        platform.    -   59. The medium of embodiment 51, wherein the receiving social        media content data from the social media platform is scheduled        on a periodic basis.    -   60. The medium of embodiment 51, wherein the receiving social        media content data from the social media platform is performed        on demand.    -   61. The medium of embodiment 51, wherein the type of the        received media content data comprises any of structured data and        unstructured data.    -   62. The medium of embodiment 61, wherein the structured data        comprises any of a number of user social media connections and a        user profile.    -   63. The medium of embodiment 61, wherein the unstructured data        comprises raw texts of social media comments.    -   64. The medium of embodiment 61, wherein the tagging the        received media content data comprises tagging unstructured data        based on category of data content.    -   65. The medium of embodiment 51, wherein progressive taxonomy        mechanism comprises a set of pre-determined key terms.    -   66. The medium of embodiment 65, further comprising:    -   querying the social media content based on a key term; and    -   tagging the social media content with the key term when the        query finds such key term.    -   67. The medium of embodiment 65, further comprising:    -   perform text analytics on the social media content.    -   68. The medium of embodiment 51, wherein the social media        analytics request comprises an impression request of the item.    -   69. The medium of embodiment 51, further comprising: determining        a key word for the item.    -   70. The medium of embodiment 51, wherein the item comprises a TV        show.    -   71. The medium of embodiment 51, wherein the item comprises a        brand name product.    -   72. The medium of embodiment 69, further comprising: determining        whether tags of unstructured data includes the key word.    -   73. The medium of embodiment 51, wherein the determining        impression heuristics comprises assigning a weight value to the        social media content based on the progressive mechanism.    -   74. The medium of embodiment 51, wherein the determining        impression heuristics of the item based on query results        comprises calculating an impression score.    -   75. The medium of embodiment 51, wherein the impression        heuristics is determined based on statistical analysis of social        media content.

Further embodiments of cross media channel analytics may comprise thefollowing:

-   -   1. A media analytics processor-implemented method, comprising:    -   receiving a user impression media analytics request including an        identified object;    -   obtaining media analytics parameters from a user interface;    -   obtaining user authorization credentials for accessing user        media exposure data;    -   obtaining user media exposure data from a variety of data        channels upon verification of the obtained user authorization        credentials;    -   querying for user impression data related to the identified        object from the obtained user media exposure data;    -   classifying the queried user impression data related to the        identified object based on different classification measures;        and    -   generating user impression reports for the identified object.    -   2. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the identified object        comprises a TV show.    -   3. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the identified object        comprises a brand name.    -   4. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the media analytics        parameters comprise any of a TV network, a TV show genre, a TV        show name.    -   5. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the media analytics        parameters further comprise user gender, age group, user        interface types, user phone type, day part time range and user        location.    -   6. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the media analytics        parameters further comprise types of social media platform.    -   7. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the obtaining user        authorization credentials comprises recruiting social media        users to share social content.    -   8. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the obtaining user        authorization credentials further comprises prompting a user to        provide social media login credentials.    -   9. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the obtaining user        authorization credentials further comprises redirecting a user        to a social media login page.    -   10. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the user media exposure        data comprises any of user website visits, social media content        and TV viewing data.    -   11. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the variety of data        channels comprise a mobile meter.    -   12. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the variety of data        channels comprise a mobile application instantiated on a user        mobile device.    -   13. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the variety of data        channels comprise social media.    -   14. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the variety of data        channels comprise flash/HTTP cookies.    -   15. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the user media exposure        data further comprises user responses to survey questions, GPS        locations, user application usage, and mobile search behavior.    -   16. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the querying for user        impression data comprises a progressive search based on the        identified object related key terms.    -   17. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the classification        measures comprise any of user gender, user age group, day of        week, and day part time range.    -   18. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the user impression        reports are classified by the classification measures.    -   19. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the user impression        reports comprise application data statistics as to any of:        number of total application sessions, media session length,        number of total users.    -   20. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the user impression        reports further comprise any of unique users, percent active        reach, time per person, number of visits, number of pages        viewed, visits/person, user gender, and age groups.    -   21. A media analytics system, comprising:    -   a memory;    -   a processor disposed in communication with said memory, and        configured to issue a plurality of processing instructions        stored in the memory, wherein the processor issues instructions        to:    -   receive a user impression media analytics request including an        identified object;    -   obtain media analytics parameters from a user interface;    -   obtain user authorization credentials for accessing user media        exposure data;    -   obtain user media exposure data from a variety of data channels        upon verification of the obtained user authorization        credentials;    -   query for user impression data related to the identified object        from the obtained user media exposure data;    -   classify the queried user impression data related to the        identified object based on different classification measures;        and    -   generate user impression reports for the identified object.    -   22. The system of embodiment 21, wherein the identified object        comprises a TV show.    -   23. The system of embodiment 21, wherein the identified object        comprises a brand name.    -   24. The system of embodiment 21, wherein the media analytics        parameters comprise any of a TV network, a TV show genre, a TV        show name.    -   25. The system of embodiment 21, wherein the media analytics        parameters further comprise user gender, age group, user        interface types, user phone type, day part time range and user        location.    -   26. The system of embodiment 21, wherein the media analytics        parameters further comprise types of social media platform.    -   27. The system of embodiment 21, wherein the obtaining user        authorization credentials comprises recruiting social media        users to share social content.    -   28. The system of embodiment 21, wherein the obtaining user        authorization credentials further comprises prompting a user to        provide social media login credentials.    -   29. The system of embodiment 21, wherein the obtaining user        authorization credentials further comprises redirecting a user        to a social media login page.    -   30. The system of embodiment 21, wherein the user media exposure        data comprises any of user website visits, social media content        and TV viewing data.    -   31. The system of embodiment 21, wherein the variety of data        channels comprise a mobile meter.    -   32. The system of embodiment 21, wherein the variety of data        channels comprise a mobile application instantiated on a user        mobile device.    -   33. The system of embodiment 21, wherein the variety of data        channels comprise social media.    -   34. The system of embodiment 21, wherein the variety of data        channels comprise flash/HTTP cookies.    -   35. The system of embodiment 21, wherein the user media exposure        data further comprises user responses to survey questions, GPS        locations, user application usage, and mobile search behavior.    -   36. The system of embodiment 21, wherein the querying for user        impression data comprises a progressive search based on the        identified object related key terms.    -   37. The system of embodiment 21, wherein the classification        measures comprise any of user gender, user age group, day of        week, and day part time range.    -   38. The system of embodiment 21, wherein the user impression        reports are classified by the classification measures.    -   39. The system of embodiment 21, wherein the user impression        reports comprise application data statistics as to any of:        number of total application sessions, media session length,        number of total users.    -   40. The system of embodiment 21, wherein the user impression        reports further comprise any of unique users, percent active        reach, time per person, number of visits, number of pages        viewed, visits/person, user gender, and age groups.    -   41. A media analytics processor-readable storage medium storing        processor-executable instructions to:    -   receive a user impression media analytics request including an        identified object;    -   obtain media analytics parameters from a user interface;    -   obtain user authorization credentials for accessing user media        exposure data;    -   obtain user media exposure data from a variety of data channels        upon verification of the obtained user authorization        credentials;    -   query for user impression data related to the identified object        from the obtained user media exposure data;    -   classify the queried user impression data related to the        identified object based on different classification measures;        and    -   generate user impression reports for the identified object.    -   42. The medium of embodiment 41, wherein the identified object        comprises a TV show.    -   43. The medium of embodiment 41, wherein the identified object        comprises a brand name.    -   44. The medium of embodiment 41, wherein the media analytics        parameters comprise any of a TV network, a TV show genre, a TV        show name.    -   45. The medium of embodiment 41, wherein the media analytics        parameters further comprise user gender, age group, user        interface types, user phone type, day part time range and user        location.    -   46. The medium of embodiment 41, wherein the media analytics        parameters further comprise types of social media platform.    -   47. The medium of embodiment 41, wherein the obtaining user        authorization credentials comprises recruiting social media        users to share social content.    -   48. The medium of embodiment 41, wherein the obtaining user        authorization credentials further comprises prompting a user to        provide social media login credentials.    -   49. The medium of embodiment 41, wherein the obtaining user        authorization credentials further comprises redirecting a user        to a social media login page.    -   40. The medium of embodiment 41, wherein the user media exposure        data comprises any of user website visits, social media content        and TV viewing data.    -   51. The medium of embodiment 41, wherein the variety of data        channels comprise a mobile meter.    -   52. The medium of embodiment 41, wherein the variety of data        channels comprise a mobile application instantiated on a user        mobile device.    -   53. The medium of embodiment 41, wherein the variety of data        channels comprise social media.    -   54. The medium of embodiment 41, wherein the variety of data        channels comprise flash/HTTP cookies.    -   55. The medium of embodiment 41, wherein the user media exposure        data further comprises user responses to survey questions, GPS        locations, user application usage, and mobile search behavior.    -   56. The medium of embodiment 41, wherein the querying for user        impression data comprises a progressive search based on the        identified object related key terms.    -   57. The medium of embodiment 41, wherein the classification        measures comprise any of user gender, user age group, day of        week, and day part time range.    -   58. The medium of embodiment 41, wherein the user impression        reports are classified by the classification measures.    -   59. The medium of embodiment 41, wherein the user impression        reports comprise application data statistics as to any of:        number of total application sessions, media session length,        number of total users.    -   60. The medium of embodiment 41, wherein the user impression        reports further comprise any of unique users, percent active        reach, time per person, number of visits, number of pages        viewed, visits/person, user gender, and age groups.

Further embodiments of mobile data tracking may comprise the following:

-   -   1. A mobile content tracking and analyzing processor-implemented        method, comprising:    -   obtaining a user mobile device identifier;    -   monitoring data traffic coming in and out of the user mobile        device based on the obtained user mobile device identifier via a        mobile usage tracking entity;    -   parsing the monitored data traffic to determine a data content        type of the data traffic;    -   determining user media content exposure information from the        parsed monitored data traffic based on the data content type;        and    -   generating user media content exposure statistics data.    -   2. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the user mobile device        identifier comprises a hardware identifier.    -   3. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the user mobile device        identifier comprises a physical address.    -   4. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the data traffic is        obtained via a mobile application instantiated on the user        mobile device.    -   5. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the monitoring data        traffic is obtained via a mobile meter.    -   6. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the determine a data        content type of the data traffic comprises extracting a data        type filed value from a data event message.    -   7. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the data content type        comprises any of:    -   a URL link, application information, media usage data, survey        response data, and social data.    -   8. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the determining user        media content exposure information comprises:    -   determining the monitored data traffic comprises a URL link; and    -   determining the URL link includes an advertisement.    -   9. The method of embodiment 8, wherein the determining user        media content exposure information further comprises:    -   determining a classification of the advertisement;    -   obtaining identifying information of the advertisement; and    -   storing the identifying information with the user as        advertisement exposure information.    -   10. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the determining user        media content exposure information comprises:    -   determining the monitored data traffic comprises application        information;    -   determining device application inventory; and    -   obtaining application group sharing information    -   11. The method of embodiment 10, wherein the application group        sharing information comprises a list of social connections.    -   12. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the determining user        media content exposure information comprises:    -   determining the monitored data traffic comprises media usage        information; and    -   determining a media title.    -   13. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the determining user        media content exposure information comprises:    -   determining the monitored data traffic comprises social content;        and    -   processing the social content to extract user impression        indication.    -   14. The method of embodiment 13, wherein the user impression        indication is related to a product name.    -   15. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the data traffic is        monitored at a proxy server.    -   16. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the monitored data        traffic further comprises any of:    -   TV channel changing events, mobile advertising data, mobile        application usage data, social media profile, social media        comments, and website visits.    -   17. The method of embodiment 1, wherein the user media content        exposure statistics data comprises any of user brand impression        measures.    -   18. The method of embodiment 17, wherein the user brand        impression measures comprises a list of top mentioned brands.    -   19. The method of embodiment 1, further comprising:    -   providing and generating individualized ad contents to the user        mobile device based on the generated user media content exposure        statistics data.    -   20. The method of embodiment 1, further comprising:    -   generating individualized survey questions to the user mobile        device based on the generated user media content exposure        statistics data.    -   21. A mobile content tracking and analyzing system, comprising:    -   a memory;    -   a processor disposed in communication with said memory, and        configured to issue a plurality of processing instructions        stored in the memory, wherein the processor issues instructions        to:    -   obtain a user mobile device identifier;    -   monitor data traffic coming in and out of the user mobile device        based on the obtained user mobile device identifier via a mobile        usage tracking entity;    -   parse the monitored data traffic to determine a data content        type of the data traffic;    -   determine user media content exposure information from the        parsed monitored data traffic based on the data content type;        and    -   generate user media content exposure statistics data.    -   22. The system of embodiment 21, wherein the user mobile device        identifier comprises a hardware identifier.    -   23. The system of embodiment 21, wherein the user mobile device        identifier comprises a physical address.    -   24. The system of embodiment 21, wherein the data traffic is        obtained via a mobile application instantiated on the user        mobile device.    -   25. The system of embodiment 21, wherein the monitoring data        traffic is obtained via a mobile meter.    -   26. The system of embodiment 21, wherein the determine a data        content type of the data traffic comprises extracting a data        type filed value from a data event message.    -   27. The system of embodiment 21, wherein the data content type        comprises any of:    -   a URL link, application information, media usage data, survey        response data, and social data.    -   28. The system of embodiment 21, wherein the determining user        media content exposure information comprises:    -   determining the monitored data traffic comprises a URL link; and    -   determining the URL link includes an advertisement.    -   29. The system of embodiment 28, wherein the determining user        media content exposure information further comprises:    -   determining a classification of the advertisement;    -   obtaining identifying information of the advertisement; and    -   storing the identifying information with the user as        advertisement exposure information.    -   30. The system of embodiment 21, wherein the determining user        media content exposure information comprises:    -   determining the monitored data traffic comprises application        information;    -   determining device application inventory; and    -   obtaining application group sharing information    -   31. The system of embodiment 30, wherein the application group        sharing information comprises a list of social connections.    -   32. The system of embodiment 21, wherein the determining user        media content exposure information comprises:    -   determining the monitored data traffic comprises media usage        information; and    -   determining a media title.    -   33. The system of embodiment 21, wherein the determining user        media content exposure information comprises:    -   determining the monitored data traffic comprises social content;        and    -   processing the social content to extract user impression        indication.    -   34. The system of embodiment 33, wherein the user impression        indication is related to a product name.    -   35. The system of embodiment 21, wherein the data traffic is        monitored at a proxy server.    -   36. The system of embodiment 21, wherein the monitored data        traffic further comprises any of:    -   TV channel changing events, mobile advertising data, mobile        application usage data, social media profile, social media        comments, and website visits.    -   37. The system of embodiment 21, wherein the user media content        exposure statistics data comprises any of user brand impression        measures.    -   38. The system of embodiment 37, wherein the user brand        impression measures comprises a list of top mentioned brands.    -   39. The system of embodiment 21, further comprising:    -   providing and generating individualized ad contents to the user        mobile device based on the generated user media content exposure        statistics data.    -   40. The system of embodiment 21, further comprising:    -   generating individualized survey questions to the user mobile        device based on the generated user media content exposure        statistics data.    -   41. A mobile content tracking and analyzing        processor-implemented storage medium storing        processor-executable instructions to:    -   obtain a user mobile device identifier;    -   monitor data traffic coming in and out of the user mobile device        based on the obtained user mobile device identifier via a mobile        usage tracking entity;    -   parse the monitored data traffic to determine a data content        type of the data traffic;    -   determine user media content exposure information from the        parsed monitored data traffic based on the data content type;        and    -   generate user media content exposure statistics data.    -   42. The medium of embodiment 41, wherein the user mobile device        identifier comprises a hardware identifier.    -   43. The medium of embodiment 41, wherein the user mobile device        identifier comprises a physical address.    -   44. The medium of embodiment 41, wherein the data traffic is        obtained via a mobile application instantiated on the user        mobile device.    -   45. The medium of embodiment 41, wherein the monitoring data        traffic is obtained via a mobile meter.    -   46. The medium of embodiment 41, wherein the determine a data        content type of the data traffic comprises extracting a data        type filed value from a data event message.    -   47. The medium of embodiment 41, wherein the data content type        comprises any of:    -   a URL link, application information, media usage data, survey        response data, and social data.    -   48. The medium of embodiment 41, wherein the determining user        media content exposure information comprises:    -   determining the monitored data traffic comprises a URL link; and    -   determining the URL link includes an advertisement.    -   49. The medium of embodiment 28, wherein the determining user        media content exposure information further comprises:    -   determining a classification of the advertisement;    -   obtaining identifying information of the advertisement; and    -   storing the identifying information with the user as        advertisement exposure information.    -   50. The medium of embodiment 41, wherein the determining user        media content exposure information comprises:    -   determining the monitored data traffic comprises application        information;    -   determining device application inventory; and    -   obtaining application group sharing information    -   51. The medium of embodiment 30, wherein the application group        sharing information comprises a list of social connections.    -   52. The medium of embodiment 41, wherein the determining user        media content exposure information comprises:    -   determining the monitored data traffic comprises media usage        information; and    -   determining a media title.    -   53. The medium of embodiment 41, wherein the determining user        media content exposure information comprises:    -   determining the monitored data traffic comprises social content;        and    -   processing the social content to extract user impression        indication.    -   54. The medium of embodiment 33, wherein the user impression        indication is related to a product name.    -   55. The medium of embodiment 41, wherein the data traffic is        monitored at a proxy server.    -   56. The medium of embodiment 41, wherein the monitored data        traffic further comprises any of:    -   TV channel changing events, mobile advertising data, mobile        application usage data, social media profile, social media        comments, and website visits.    -   57. The medium of embodiment 41, wherein the user media content        exposure statistics data comprises any of user brand impression        measures.    -   58. The medium of embodiment 57, wherein the user brand        impression measures comprises a list of top mentioned brands.    -   59. The medium of embodiment 41, further comprising:    -   providing and generating individualized ad contents to the user        mobile device based on the generated user media content exposure        statistics data.    -   60. The medium of embodiment 41, further comprising:    -   generating individualized survey questions to the user mobile        device based on the generated user media content exposure        statistics data.

In order to address various issues and advance the art, the entirety ofthis application for MOBILE REMOTE MEDIA CONTROL PLATFORM APPARATUSESAND SYSTEMS (including the Cover Page, Title, Headings, Field,Background, Summary, Brief Description of the Drawings, DetailedDescription, Embodiments, Abstract, Figures, Appendices, and otherwise)shows, by way of illustration, various embodiments in which the claimedinnovations may be practiced. The advantages and features of theapplication are of a representative sample of embodiments only, and arenot exhaustive and/or exclusive. They are presented only to assist inunderstanding and teach the claimed principles. It should be understoodthat they are not representative of all claimed innovations. As such,certain aspects of the disclosure have not been discussed herein. Thatalternate embodiments may not have been presented for a specific portionof the innovations or that further undescribed alternate embodiments maybe available for a portion is not to be considered a disclaimer of thosealternate embodiments. It may be appreciated that many of thoseundescribed embodiments incorporate the same principles of theinnovations and others are equivalent. Thus, it is to be understood thatother embodiments may be utilized and functional, logical, operational,organizational, structural and/or topological modifications may be madewithout departing from the scope and/or spirit of the disclosure. Assuch, all examples and/or embodiments are deemed to be non-limitingthroughout this disclosure. Also, no inference should be drawn regardingthose embodiments discussed herein relative to those not discussedherein other than it is as such for purposes of reducing space andrepetition. For instance, it is to be understood that the logical and/ortopological structure of any combination of any program components (acomponent collection), other components and/or any present feature setsas described in the figures and/or throughout are not limited to a fixedoperating order and/or arrangement, but rather, any disclosed order isexemplary and all equivalents, regardless of order, are contemplated bythe disclosure. Furthermore, it is to be understood that such featuresare not limited to serial execution, but rather, any number of threads,processes, services, servers, and/or the like that may executeasynchronously, concurrently, in parallel, simultaneously,synchronously, and/or the like are contemplated by the disclosure. Assuch, some of these features may be mutually contradictory, in that theycannot be simultaneously present in a single embodiment. Similarly, somefeatures are applicable to one aspect of the innovations, andinapplicable to others. In addition, the disclosure includes otherinnovations not presently claimed. Applicant reserves all rights inthose presently unclaimed innovations including the right to embodimentsuch innovations, file additional applications, continuations,continuations in part, divisions, and/or the like thereof. As such, itshould be understood that advantages, embodiments, examples, functional,features, logical, operational, organizational, structural, topological,and/or other aspects of the disclosure are not to be consideredlimitations on the disclosure as defined by the embodiments orlimitations on equivalents to the embodiments. It is to be understoodthat, depending on the particular needs and/or characteristics of aMR-Control individual and/or enterprise user, database configurationand/or relational model, data type, data transmission and/or networkframework, syntax structure, and/or the like, various embodiments of theMR-Control, may be implemented that facilitates a great deal offlexibility and customization. While various embodiments and discussionsof the MR-Control have been directed to social networks, however, it isto be understood that the embodiments described herein may be readilyconfigured and/or customized for a wide variety of other applicationsand/or implementations.

What is claimed is:
 1. A TV mobile control system, comprising: a memory;a processor disposed in communication with said memory, and configuredto issue a plurality of processing instructions stored in the memory,wherein the processor issues instructions to: obtain TV program schedulelisting data; provide the obtained TV program schedule listing data to auser mobile device communicatively coupled to an infrared communicationcomponent; receive a user media program selection message from the usermobile device, wherein the user mobile device transmits a TV remotechannel selection indication to a TV set via the infrared communicationcomponent, wherein the user media program selection message and the TVremote channel selection indication comprise the same user selectedchannel; receive, from the user mobile device, audience monitoringatmospherics data including ambient multimedia recording captured by theuser mobile device; analyze the audience monitoring atmospherics data toidentify audience watching environment background noise; determinewhether the received user media program selection message indicates auser watching event based on the identified audience watchingenvironment background noise; determine a user watching time lengthassociated with the user selected channel when the received user mediaprogram selection message is determined to indicate the user watchingevent; and generate and storing a user watching event log file includingthe user selected channel and the determined user watching time length.2. The system of claim 1, wherein the processor further issuesinstructions to: filter the received user media program selectionmessage when the received user media program selection message isdetermined not to indicate a user watching event.
 3. The system of claim1, wherein the user mobile device comprises any of a smartphone, apersonal data assistant, a cellular phone, a laptop, a tablet computer,and a standalone table unit.
 4. The system of claim 1, wherein the TVprogram schedule listing data is transmitted via a wireless network. 5.The system of claim 1, wherein the user mobile device transmits a TVremote channel selection indication to a TV set-top box via the infraredcommunication component, wherein the infrared communication componentcomprises a plug-in component.
 6. The system of claim 1, wherein the TVremote channel selection message comprises a non-live media programselection message.
 7. The system of claim 1, wherein the non-live mediaprogram selection message comprises any of a DVD control message, a DVRcontrol message and an on-demand media control message.
 8. The system ofclaim 1, wherein the processor further issues instructions to: calculatea time lapse between two consecutively received program selectionmessages; and determine whether the time lapse is sufficiently long toindicate a user watching event.
 9. The system of claim 1, wherein thedetermining a user watching time length comprises determining whether atime lapse between two consecutively received program selection messagesexceeds a capping threshold.
 10. The system of claim 1, wherein thedetermining a user watching time length comprises applying watching timecaps based on any of TV on/off events, set-top box on/off events andheuristics.
 11. The system of claim 1, wherein the processor furtherissues instructions to feed the user watching event log file for userviewing data record associated with the selected media program.
 12. Thesystem of claim 1, wherein the user mobile device is configured tooperate any of the following: automatically scan on a communicationstack for a physical address of a TV set; and connecting to a TV setbased on user configured physical address.
 13. The system of claim 1,wherein the user mobile device receives user submitted TV parameters toscan for a TV set.
 14. The system of claim 1, wherein the processorfurther issues instructions to: receive an atmospherics data packagefrom the user mobile device; and obtain an atmospherics data artifactfrom the atmospherics data package.
 15. The system of claim 14, whereinthe processor further issues instructions to: extract user instantactivities information based on analysis of the atmospherics dataartifact.
 16. The system of claim 15, wherein the processor furtherissues instructions to: generate a user viewing status indication basedon the user instant activities information; and incorporate the userviewing status indication into viewer measurement data of the userselected channel.
 17. The system of claim 1, wherein the received TVprogram schedule listing data is received at a server and comprises aplurality of ad tags.
 18. The system of claim 17, wherein the processorfurther issues instructions to: retrieve an ad tag associated with theuser selected media program from the TV program schedule listing data.19. The system of claim 1, wherein the processor further issuesinstructions to: retrieve an ad tag associated with the user selectedmedia program from the TV program schedule listing data; and generate aproduct survey question based on the ad tag.
 20. A TV mobile controlprocessor-readable non-transitory storage medium storingprocessor-executable instructions to: obtain TV program schedule listingdata; provide the obtained TV program schedule listing data to a usermobile device communicatively coupled to an infrared communicationcomponent; receive a user media program selection message from the usermobile device, wherein the user mobile device transmits a TV remotechannel selection indication to a TV set via the infrared communicationcomponent, wherein the user media program selection message and the TVremote channel selection indication comprise the same user selectedchannel; receive, from the user mobile device, audience monitoringatmospherics data including ambient multimedia recording captured by theuser mobile device; analyze the audience monitoring atmospherics data toidentify audience watching environment background noise; determinewhether the received user media program selection message indicates auser watching event based on the identified audience watchingenvironment background noise; determine a user watching time lengthassociated with the user selected channel when the received user mediaprogram selection message is determined to indicate the user watchingevent; and generate and storing a user watching event log file includingthe user selected channel and the determined user watching time length.21. A TV mobile control system, comprising: means for obtaining TVprogram schedule listing data at a remote server; means for providingthe obtained TV program schedule listing data to a user mobile devicecommunicatively coupled to an infrared communication component; whereinthe provided TV program schedule listing data is loaded into a TV mobilecontrol component instantiated on the user mobile device; means forreceiving a user media program selection message from the user mobiledevice, wherein the user mobile device transmits a TV remote channelselection indication to a TV set via the infrared communicationcomponent, wherein the TV mobile control component instantiated on theuser mobile device automatically generates and transmits a social mediamessage indicating the user media program selection to a social mediaplatform; means for receiving, from the user mobile device, audiencemonitoring atmospherics data including ambient multimedia recordingcaptured by the user mobile device; means for analyzing the ambientmultimedia recording to identify audience watching environmentbackground noise; means for determining the user is engaged in watchingthe user selected channel based on the identified audience watchingenvironment background noise; means for determining whether the receiveduser media program selection message indicates a user watching eventbased on the analysis of the ambient multimedia recording; means fordetermining a user watching time length associated with the userselected channel when the received user media program selection messageis determined to indicate the user watching event; and means forgenerating and storing a user watching event log file including the userselected channel and the determined user watching time length, said userwatching event log file indicating that the user has been engaged inwatching the media program for the determined user watching time length.